Flux
by Isadora26
Summary: Sam's visions are out of control on the boys current case.
1. Chapter 1

1**_Flux_**

_I can make it all stop_

"No." His voice seemed to ebb and flow on the tides inside his head.

_You can make it stop_

"Go to hell." It was more of a groan then a statement, laced with pain and an agony that ran bone deep...seeping past the realm of description and into something even more frightening.

_Just say the word_

There was never a moment where he considered it. Not through the pain...not through the haze that the pain caused. The figure pulled back his jaw tight in a thin line of anger as he glared down at Sam's prone form.

_Don't say I never gave you a chance_

_**FLASH**_

The same voice droned on against a broken sob in the strobe of a light that came against a darkened hallway. A lone figure was picking herself up along the red hued walls her tears laced with enough rage and anger to rival the feelings flooding through Sam.

_I can make it stop_

"Go to hell!" She screamed holding her arm to her body protectively. Sam could see a bone protruding from the elbow, yet even amongst that she seemed resolved to stand her ground. Her head jerked back from some unseen force and she gave a grunt against the agony breathing in in hard pants of fervent tears.

_You can make it stop_

"I said..." She broke off in a gurgled gasp as Sam saw a faint outline against the strobes flash. The figure was standing with locks of her auburn hair in his hand holding her head steady as his fingers slowly trailed across her face...down her neck. The figure's fingers slowly moved back upward to her left temple. Sam narrowed his eyes as she suddenly screamed...the fingers entered her head becoming incorporeal as they passed through her meager defenses offered by her body.

The apparition leaned closer to her his blue lips flush against her ear. _Just say the word_

"No." It was a broken syllable choked out as her eyes met the spirits without flinching even through the terror and pain.

_Don't say I never gave you a chance_

She screamed louder as his whole hand was thrust into her head and Sam watched helplessly as her body gave a final shudder pitching back hard against the wall before the being before her withdrew to allow her lifeless form to sink to the floor.

Chapter One

She cracked her neck after knocking back the shot sitting on the gray counter before her. It was another long day in a list of long days that had come before and this was just a normal beginning.

"You leaving?" Vincent asked at her back before grinding the cigarette out in the ash tray beside the tray of needles and paints.

"Yeah." She nodded her back still to him as she stared out the window. "Stick a fork in me." She smiled full on as she turned, her deep melodic voice getting his full attention. Vincent shook his head with a chuckle as she grabbed her coat from the hook near the door and began to pull it on.

"Stay out of trouble." He replied watching her walk toward the door.

"Who me?" She laughed. She readjusted the necklaces and bracelets that got caught on the leather jacket and then pulled at her white dingy tank to cover her bra.

"I mean it Leah...I'm not bailing you out." Vincent's smile was slowly dwindling.

"Have I ever asked you to?" Leah simply replied as she walked out the door.

She had a nice quiet walk to the subway entrance passed the throngs of people just now rousing to a bustling world on their way to their day jobs. Her own day was a wealth of possibilities though and she smiled at that as she bumped into a police officer with a soft apologetic smile and then moved onto her train home.

She was all the way back to the apartment before she pulled his wallet from her pocket and opened it for the cash it held inside. Officer Miller didn't really need the $48 and change resting there...at least not as much as she did today.

Leah sank into the lull of a hot shower thoughts of sleep long forgotten as she needed to make her way to her own day job.

OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

Dean rolled over with a groan and took in the sound of panting from the floor. Not again...not now. They had just come from a hunt and were both exhausted...Sam needed to sleep...not this. Dean yanked the blankets back and stepped out of the bed instantly falling into a crouch beside Sam. He grabbed his brothers shoulders worriedly.

"Sam...Sam...come on buddy...what's going on?" Dean's voice mirrored the lack of sleep and startled effect that each vision seem to cut into him. He knew that he may never understand what it was like for his brother...and that the fear that Sam felt had become so apparent with each passing death omen. Now his own brother's fear fed into him deeply though his walls were quickly being thrown up to find some way to shrug this one off even as he waited for the explanation.

"A girl..." Sam started trying to catch his breath as his hands went to his head his eyes slamming shut tightly against the splitting pain there. "She was in some sort of circular corridor...the walls were red...there was a light...kept flashing..." Sam seemed to be trying to force it out as Dean's arms wrapped further around him and he helped him to the edge of the bed. "Some sort of spirit was killing her. Had it's hand in her head."

"Dude, in her head?" Dean made a face as he went to get a cool wash cloth and a glass of water. Sam's pallor had him worried as well as the vision. Mainly because this all had some connection to the demon and Sam had been having far too many lately. "Flashing light? Like a strobe? Some freaky disco club?" Dean called over his shoulder as he turned the water on to wet the cloth. That's all they needed some YMCA retro club to add horror to the already nasty reminiscent spirit of some head case wacko that wanted to get it's hand inside its victim's heads. Not to mention whatever freaky tie to the demon all that had. He set the cloth to the side and ripped the plastic from one of the counter top cups before filling it with water.

"No it was slower...would come and go...there was some sort of mechanical noise over head." Sam rested his head in his hands as he propped his elbows up on his knees.

"Lighthouse?" Dean paused on his way back to Sam as he realized how close to the coast they were. Sam looked up at that as if it fit and took the offered cloth and cup.

"Could have been." Sam agreed.

"I wonder how many are still operational near here." Dean thought out loud as he watched Sam slowly easing out of the after effects of the vision. He breathed a sigh of relief and waited for more explanation.

"That was weird though...it was like a double vision." Sam shook his head rubbing at his eyes as he downed another sip of the water.

"What do you mean?" Dean felt the relief washed away in the blink of an eye at that.

"Well it started with the spirit talking to me." Sam met Dean's eyes worriedly. "I was here in the room, alone laying on the floor...Probably just the lead in from some dream."

"Yeah." Dean wasn't going to argue with him. That at least sounded more reassuring then the spirit being here with Sam playing around with his brother's head. Still he had his reservations about not pursuing that line of questioning. "I'm sure that's all it was..." Dean let a smile cross his face glad Sam was still meeting his eyes for the full effect. "Must have been that bag of gummy bears before bed."

Sam half grinned a certain level of disbelief playing across his face. "Yeah."

OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

Leah finished towel drying her hair with a sigh as she sang along to the radio playing in the background. She had just wrapped the towel around her body, tucking it in at the top and jammed her tooth brush in her mouth when she had to grab the sink with both hands for support.

No no no ...not now. She gripped the porcelain til her knuckles turned white as if somehow her grip on it was going to help...she knew better. She felt the whole fo the bathroom begin to shake around her as if the vision of it was in the thralls of an earthquake and slammed her eyes shut to keep from getting sick at her stomach. "No no no no." This time she vocalized it as the world around her shifted.

She landed hard feeling her foot slam into something wet and solid before it slid into a hole. She fell forward and caught herself on the wall screaming "Dammit." as she hit. She paused there out of breath scared to open her eyes. She didn't really want to know...not really...well sort of...kind of...maybe. She inched one eye open and took in the dimly lit bathroom.

It wasn't her own...in fact it looked like a hotel bathroom. "God I hope no one has this room." She breathed out as she opened her other eye and took in the bag near the bathroom door. "Sh..." She broke off holding both hand up in the air as two men appeared with a gun at the ready. "It." She finished with a smiled trying to hold her balance from where her foot had gotten jammed into the toilet.

She slowly smiled as she held her position. "Hi there." She whispered.


	2. Chapter 2

1Chapter Two

Dean kept the gun aimed at the woman his eyes going wide as he looked down the length of her body not expecting in a million years to find a girl scantily clad in the bathroom he had just been in. God was he losing his mind? There wasn't a window so...Dean cocked the gun waiting for one hell of an explanation.

"She was the girl in my vision." Sam's whisper got his muscle to relax slightly as he took his finger off the trigger angling his head in Sam's direction just enough to make sure he had heard him right.

"The one with the hand in her head?" Dean scrunched his face up at that picture and finally completely lowered the gun.

"It's alright." Sam offered finally acknowledging that she was there...still holding her hands up as she adjusted her balance to compensate for the lack of coordination due to her foot being jammed in the toilet.

She lowered her arms as Dean lowered the gun and everyone finally breathed a sigh of relief all the way around. Leah hopped on her free foot trying to adjust her towel as she took in the fact that she hadn't been able to hear their whispering do to being half deaf already. "So uh...I know you have to be wondering how I got in here." Her half cocked smile around the tooth brush wasn't all that comforting leading to a sort of really wacko look across her face.

Leah realized as she spoke that she still had her tooth brush in her mouth and quickly pulled it from between her teeth her smile broadening to look less insane. "Sorry." She chuckled softly under her breath as she rolled her eyes to herself. "Ok here's the drill...I usually don't just end up anywhere and you're going to think I'm nuts...but I am so tired of trying to explain this in any way that makes sense...so I'm just going to shoot straight with ya...alrighty?"

Dean raised an eyebrow a slow steady smile growing across his face. 'That would be great" He nodded a hint of sarcasm coating his voice.

"Just..." She held up one finger up as she reached down bending at the waist to get a good grip on her ankle and she quickly gave her foot a good yank."Give...me...two ...seconds...Whooo..." She fell backward into the wall and let out a loud laugh as she straightened up a bit winded looking back to the toilet as her smile slowly faded. "I hope you guys flushed."

"Are you alright?" Sam asked starring at her in complete bafflement. Dean was trying to keep from laughing though and had managed it save a slight chuckle that he had to cover with a cough.

"Dandy." She replied straightening. She smoothed her towel out like it was a designer suite and set her tooth brush down on the sink. "Oh yeah...why I'm here..."

"Yeah." Dean nodded wondering if he should aim again. This woman had to be psycho.

"I'm here to help you." She beamed suddenly.

Dean furrowed his brows together running a hand over his eyes tiredly with an exaggerated turn of his head in Sam's direction. He forced a smile that was just brimming with a 'Can we talk' look. "You're here to help us?" He replied almost having to laugh at that. Sam was the one that had the vision...they were supposed to be looking for her to help her. "How?"

"That part isn't always clear...just that when I tend to blink unexpectantly...and to some unknown location... I always end up where I'm needed..." Her eyes traveled to the gun a moment before she regained the vigor to her smile. "Though you two look plenty capable..."

"Blink?" Dean and Sam asked in unison.

"Yeah I named it myself...that's what those warlocks on Charmed do isn't it...disappear and reappear here and there...sounded close enough to me." She seemed proud of herself for naming her ability, but Dean and Sam could only exchange a glance before Sam had to ask.

"So you can go from place to place...instantly?" Sam was amazed. If she had an ability like his then that had to be the connection to his vision, but that was one amazing ability if what she said was true.

"Yeah...only catch is I can't control it very well...and here lately the only time it happens is when some one is in trouble. Not too neat if you can't do it when you need to. Last week some girl in Hong Kong was having problems with a mind reading thing. She couldn't get out of her ex-boyfriends head and I couldn't leave Hong Kong til I figured out how to help her. That was a fun week...I almost got fired from both my jobs when I told my bosses I had to take an emergency trip over seas to help my great aunt Karma." Leah rambled onward as if this was the most natural occurrence in the world. "So ya almost think I'm nuts, but one of you is psychic and you know I'm not crazy...right?" She smiled even brighter as she began to run her hand through her hair in the mirror trying to fix it as best she could. There was a long pause though and her hands slowly drifted to her hips as she waited for her confirmation.

"Can you read minds?" Dean asked suddenly wondering if his thought were safe since she seemed to know that Sam was psychic.

"Nope...just always end up helping psychics." She nodded. "I don't know why." She cocked her head briefly at that.

"No offense here..." Dean finally had to get in on this conversation. "How exactly do you help other psychics?" He had to know...because unless she had some other ability hidden up her sleeve so far he wasn't seeing much resemblance to any hunter he had ever met and most of the kids that were like Sam...had a demon with a use for them.

"Actually it's different for everyone...with the mind reader from Hong Kong we had to do a lot of research and go see some old guy in a dress that had his own temple...but she couldn't do it all herself...poor girl could barely get out of bed. Sometimes the only help someone needs is someone to walk them through what they already knew they had to do...other times..." She trailed off contemplatively, but was quickly able to force at least a half knowing look of happiness. "Look I'm not a fruitcake...I do know that there is some bad stuff out there...bad people...creatures..."

"Creatures?" Dean asked arching an eyebrow...he just had to find out the extent of her knowledge now.

"You know...Vampires...werewolves...things that go bump in the night..." She watched him take that in with a measure of restraint wondering what his game was. "Do you just get a kick out of girls telling you what you already know?"

"Excuse me?" Dean didn't know where that came from. "What makes you..."

"You just woke up...still have sleep in your eyes and you handle a gun like you sleep with it. You've got two knives in a bathroom essentials bag...one silver...one bronze...not to mention the box of salt." She pointed to the bag that had been laying half opened just outside the bathroom door. "You're buddy...sleeps with a gun under his pillow too as the indentation actually poked his neck enough to leave the almost faded impression of a hilt right here." She motioned to the base of Sam's neck "...and the holy water and stack of missing persons files that are stacked in the floor next to the closet there." She motioned behind Dean and Sam. " Those aren't usually carried by law enforcement...well not the holy water anyway...so I'm thinking in an attempt to play skip these twenty questions we can cut through all the bullshit and admit that your hunters. Probably even have a nifty little journal or something."

Sam couldn't help but laugh at Dean as he saw the look that crossed his face. He couldn't stop even as Dean glared at him. "Well you're observant...but how do you help with the other aspects of where this ability seems to lead you?" Dean asked worriedly. He'd seen too many innocent people die and he really didn't like the idea of this girl thinking that she needed to help them in some way.

"Very carefully." She licked at her lips shifting her gaze to the floor. "Look...I'm stuck here with you guys until whatever your problem is goes away...so can we get it over with? You obviously don't want me here...and I..." She looked down at her watch with a sigh. "Am late for work."

"I have visions...of people dying. I try to help too." Sam straightened up finally and after hearing the humor leaving her voice quickly tried to explain himself. "I just had one of you...so either way... you to help us or us to help you...you're right about one thing...seems like we've got some work to do. You were the one I saw dying though...so I'm thinking this time...it your turn to get some help."

"Wow." She mouthed readjusting her towel as she took that in slowly. "That would suck...I'm game either way...what was your vision?"

"You sure you want to know?"

"Why wouldn't I?" She shrugged. "It's not like it's going to happen...that's why we're all here. Right?" She regained her smile as she followed them out of the bathroom slinging the water off her foot. "Do either of you have anything that might fit me?"


	3. Chapter 3

1Chapter Three

Dean put the Impala in park and leaned forward over the steering wheel to take in the whole of the Lighthouse before them. They had spent the last four hours finding the two lighthouses that were still in operation in the area and this one won the coin toss because there was a newspaper article in the backlog in the HazelBluff Gazette online that reported that the keeper had disappeared two years previous. His mental state was in question at the time of the disappearance and suicide had been speculated...though a body had never been discovered.

Leaning against the wheel Dean took the slow methodical swipe of the light around the landscape as it went around and around. The illumination did little to make this place look any less creepy as the vines covering the outside of the whitewashed walls seemed to have encroached on the last of it's innocence. Dean took in the beat up blue pick up parked outside as he climbed from the car and gave the lighthouse a better look.

"Well on a scale of one to ten on the creepy this place gets an..." Dean paused with a slight moment of thoughtfulness with a slow even shrug in the lighthouse's direction. "Eight." He looked up the length of the building feeling a shiver race down his spine. It was strange to feel that unnerved without having even stepped foot in the door, but there was something about it...that just...he couldn't put his finger on it, but he sure didn't like it. Dean swallowed feeling a wave of nausea overcome him before he could sniff back the hint of fear that wavered through him.

Dean finally seemed to notice that Sam and Leah were still in the car, neither one moving for the doors as they stared through the windshield at the monstrosity before them. They looked like they were in a trance...zoned out and out of it unable to break whatever creepy factor the mere sight of the building seemed to have. Dean leaned over the door and stuck his head back in the car. "Can we get this place checked out and then get the hell out of here?"

Sam shook his head as if shaking off some sort of dream and nodded finally reaching for the door handle. "Sorry...I...that was weird."

"Yeah." Leah breathed at his back as she moved to open her door as well.

"What?" Dean asked looking back over his shoulder at the light house.

"I just thought I saw a figure in the fog." Sam replied as he climbed out of the car.

"What fog?" Dean asked in confusion. He turned from Sam again and didn't see any fog. "Man you alright?"

"Yeah." Sam nodded. "Sorry...this place is just freaking me out."

Leah paused too as she looked to where Dean had been starring only a moment ago trying to figure out what Sam was talking about in the way of fog and she felt prickles of energy race down her spine in an unnerving fashion. She had seen it too. A rolling fog coming in off the waves...a lone figure walking ahead of it as if leading it to the shore around the base of the light house. Now there was no fog. "I..."She broke off swallowing hard. This wasn't her usual approach to helping anyone.

Sure she talked the talk...but most of the time her helping involved getting someone to quit freaking out over their abilities...or helping them get better control...or finding someone who could help them get better control. Sure she had seen a few ghosts...maybe heard tale of a demon or two...but she never fought them...she was like a go between. She'd find the people some help...and then be on her way as soon as she could blink back home. Still she didn't like anyone to know that she was in over here head.

"What is wrong with you two?" Dean wasn't going to shake it off that easily. They both looked scared to death and seemed to be seeing things. He wasn't about to just walk out there with Sam not even in the game...and some amateur gumming up the whole investigation. "Cause we can come back mid morning...or later this afternoon. When there's some light."

Leah seemed to snap out of it at that. "Did I mention I'm already late for work." She shot back pushing past the fear that Dean had just seen in her eyes as Sam slammed the car door closed and started in the direction of the light house.

"I'm fine, Dean." Sam started as he shoved his hands in his pockets and fought the chill that raced through him. "Lets get this over with."

Dean shrugged again. He caught up with Sam as Leah started after them. They hadn't more then ten feet when Dean and Sam both stopped hearing Leah hit the ground behind them with a cry of surprise. Dean closed his eyes briefly in frustration before he breathed to Sam. "Why the hell did we have to bring her? She should be back at the hotel."

Sam cut him a glance before they both looked over their shoulders and watched her pick herself up off the ground. "You alright?" Sam asked as she blew a twig of grass from her lips while brushing the mud and dew soaked foliage from Dean's gray t-shirt that she had tied into a more snugly fitting mid rift around the cinched up waistband of Sam's extra pair of jeans.

"I'm peachy!" She called back in frustration before reaching down and rolling up the pants leg again. They kept coming undone and her dexterity was suffering for it.

"Peachy my ass...you should have stayed at the room." Dean threw back when Sam didn't reply about why they had to bring her along.

"No." Sam and Leah got out in unison. Dean sighed looking from one to the other.

"Why is it I feel like you two are on a whole other level of scare the hell out of me right now?" Dean threw his arms up as he pushed the latch up on the iron gate before them before swinging the waist level door open and stepped through it in defeat. "Look if anything goes wrong...don't say I didn't warn you." he further yelled as he looked to Leah and then met Sam's eyes before continuing onward.

Sam paused outside the gate feeling something squeeze in his chest as he looked after Dean meaning to step right in behind him...but something made him pause as the terror began to wind it's way around his heart...snaking into his veins like it had been mainlined. He swallowed pushing it back and stepped past the gate.

Leah moved in behind him as the fog began to slowly roll in from the coast. "Do you see that?" Sam's voice almost broke as he watched the black figure his head hunkered down...merely a shadow against the fog...his arms were spread out wide with a confident step to his slow meander in their direction. He felt Leah wrap her arms around his with a tremble as she nodded against his side, half using his body to shield her from whatever apparition they were seeing. "Dean!"

Dean paused and looked back to where Sam and Leah had stopped just past the gate. They were looking to the coast and seemed to be seeing something that scared the shit out of them. Dean looked back to where he had just been starring and didn't see a thing to have provoked the fear that was reflected in their eyes. "What? What is it?" Someone had to start talking. "What do you see?" and why wasn't he seeing it?

"A guy walking ahead of the fog coming in." Sam called out as Dean cocked his shot gun and looked back in that direction still not seeing this illusive fog.

Sam gasped as the figure walked through Dean who was still searching the night and then it's phase crackled a few feet as it seemed to move in jerking motion to their position in a fraction of the time it should have taken him. Sam had time to register that it was the spirit from his vision as the ghastly mutilated face before them smiled eliciting a scream from Leah. "Welcome home." the whisper seemed to cut through them before the figure vanished into thin air along with the fog that had surrounded him.

"What the hell was that?!" Leah screamed out pushing hard off Sam as she fell into the gate in a panic. Sam was going to tell her to calm down...that it was gone...that they had found their spirit...but something made him hesitate. Dean was heading back to them at a run, but Sam had to look up at the light house as if he couldn't help the action. The light seemed to flash right in his eyes before the vision took hold with a vengeance. Sam was on his knees before the first image had time to form within his minds eye.


	4. Chapter 4

1Chapter Four

I thought this chapter might need a warning

So here it is - Death, Violence, squimishy things - Warning served :)

The splash of water against the frigid porcelain caused a gasp on contact as the temperature instinctively caused his body to suck in a breath. He tried to pull his hands up but found the wrists bound to some sort of metal strap against the bottom of the bathtub. There was a simultaneous burn of the cold metal against his bare skin. The fluorescent light swinging back and forth in the center of the room did little to ease the terror coursing through his body as a figure in a white plastic suite carried a bucket of ice over to the bathtub, his face covered with some sort of surgical mask. He tossed the heavy chunks into the water over his body and then without a word turned back to a huge bucket on the floor to refill the small one that he was using for his current efforts.

Sam felt his teeth chattering as his eyes began to roll into the back of his head...his whole body succumbing to the trembling so hard that he could scarcely force his mind to put together what was happening.

"The pain doesn't last forever." The man said with his back still to the tub as he scooped more ice into the bucket. "You're body eventually goes numb." His voice was muffled by the mask but Sam had a feeling that the lack of emotion there betrayed the depth of insanity that rested within him.

"Please don't do this." Sam heard a whimper from his own lips, but he hadn't thought the words...hadn't even attempted to say them. "I'll be good. I swear. I won't try to leave again." He was pleading...with no concept of what he was pleading for or why. The man turned around and walked back over with the next bucket of ice.

He paused at the side of the bathtub and then with a hint of a sad smile playing at the corner of his eyes began to dump the rest of the ice over his body. "No you won't leave again." He confirmed his intentions to kill in that one moment as Sam fought the shackles around his wrists again and this time tried to get his legs moving fighting the pain from the cold against his skin. He leaned his head back wearily as he realized that they were bound as well.

Suddenly Sam realized that this wasn't happening...he felt a flash and his knees against the wet ground before the lighthouse hearing Dean screaming his names...the only warmth that he felt was Dean's hands against his shoulders. Sam looked up to the man as his eyes met the killers and yanked at the binds again in horror...this had already happened...

OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

Leah had grabbed the fence just as Sam hit his knees and Dean started running back to them. She could feel it coming...feel herself about to blink and there was nothing she could do about it. She screamed holding to the fence praying that this was going to take her back to her apartment but finding anything but relief as she suddenly found herself in some cold dank room...in pitch blackness.

Leah felt her breath catch in her throat as she fumbled in a panic around the walls searching by feel for some sort of light switch. "God...god ...god...Jesus..." She breathed word after word in a repeated fashion as she finally found a cord that struck against her cheek and yanked it down instantly wishing she hadn't as the light lit up the bathroom.

She screamed...and screamed...and screamed...until all that was holding her up melted around her and she sank to the floor. There was a bathtub ...a toilet...a sink...all normal bathroom type things...save the rotting bones that were the only remains of the figure strapped into the bathtub. Blood marred the porcelain around the shackles. Leah didn't know when she found her way to her feet ...to the door...but by the time she did and was yanking the door open she felt like she was going to throw up. She was fighting the gaging when her eyes widened at the scene beyond the door. "Oh God." She breathed her hand barely brushing against the bricks there sealing her escape before she realized that her body was preparing for another blink.

She fell against the fence right back where she had been and doubled over losing the battle with her stomach as Dean sank to the ground in front of Sam trying to get him to talk to him.

"Sam, come on..." Dean was waiting for the vision to clear, but it didn't seem to be happening. "Come on Sammy..." he noticed Leah blink in and out only gone for a brief moment and starred after her in horror as she came back and instantly began to throw up. What the hell was happening to them? "Hey you alright?" Dean called to Leah as he continued to look Sam over feeling his skin growing cold beneath his fingers. Leah continued to discard her stomachs contents without a reply as the sudden drop in Sam's body temperature got Dean's full attention.

As his eyes settled back on his brother he saw the color fading to blue around Sam's lips as a puff of his breath escaped him. "Sam snap out of it!" Dean screamed feeling the whole of the morning spiraling out if his control. Leah was moaning picking herself up off the ground by the time that Dean realized that Sam wasn't coming out of this like a normal vision. Nothing about this was normal...Sam having some hypothermic reaction to a vision was definitely in the realm of abnormal, if Sam's previous visions were the thresh hold with which to compare all others to "Leah, can you walk?" Dean called out looking to the distance between them and the car. "Leah!"

She finally looked to him with shock and tears in her eyes as she wiped at her mouth and nodded.

"Get to the car!" Dean called out as he wound his arms under Sam's and pulled the both of them to their feet with a groan. "Dude you gotta loose some weight." Dean grunted shifting Sam's dead weight against him as his body seemed to be getting colder and colder.

OOOOOOOOOOOOOO

"Don't you understand...I never wanted to hurt you." The man was insane...oh yeah. Sam fought to remain conscious as what seemed like hours had passed. He was getting so tired though. The man had been right. The pain had gone...as had any sensations left that were needed for constructive movement. He didn't feel the pain from the ice that cut into his skin...or the warmth of his blood in his hands around the shackles...he didn't feel the deep claw marks in the porcelain from where this had occurred before...to some other person.

"I understand." Sam heard himself say...even though he wasn't really going to say anything yet again. He had a feeling he was relieving what someone else had gone through in his position and that like some sort of replay he was saying whatever they had said. It was like a film that couldn't be altered. "Please don't do this..." It was his last attempt...his last breath...

Sam felt his body sink into the icy fluid his eyes rolling into the back of his head as he gave into death. He wanted it to end...wanted it to be over...was so tired...

Sam screamed coming awake against the passenger seat of the Imapala nearly causing Dean to bang his head on the roof he jumped so high.

"Sam?!" Dean didn't see much improvement in Sam's color, but at least he was awake. They were just pulling into the hotel parking lot and Sam had been locked in that damn vision for almost twenty minutes. Dean suddenly noticed the blood from what looked like deep cuts around Sam's finger nails...and grimaced at the few that were missing. This wasn't like any vision Sam had ever had. This was taking Dean to a whole new depth of terror.

"Sam?" Dean asked quieter listening to Leah shift behind them with a sigh of relief that they were back at the hotel.

"I'm freezing." Sam's teeth chattered as he forced the words out. Dean re-centered the vents that were already blasting hot air at Sam and looked back up at him in fear. Dean wasn't even going to ask about it yet. He had to get Sam warm. To get him back to normal...or at least some resemblance to it. Then he'd let him have the questions.

"It's alright...Sammy, just stay right there in the heat like that. I'm going to just run into the room and get the heat on in there...get some blankets...then I'll be right back...you got it...Right back. Leah can you keep an eye on him. You're not going to blink or anything...right?"

"God I hope not." She breathed. "Yeah I'll watch him."

Dean raced into the room and cranked the heat up as high as he could get it hoping that this hotel didn't have to change the system over it being mid spring and bordering on summer as it was. Because he was relatively sure that not many people turned the heat to high 80's this time of year. He paused under a vent waiting to feel heat before he breathed a sigh of relief smelling the dust begin to burn off the unit before he began to pull the sheet and blanket off his own bed and pile them up on Sam's. He then took the thickest blanket and ran to the car pausing to get a first aid kit from the trunk before he attempted to even open Sam's door.

By the time he came around the passenger side his arms laden with his efforts he noticed that Leah was talking incessantly to Sam trying to keep him awake. Dean yanked the door open in a frenzy of movement and quickly wrapped the blanket around Sam...before pulling him up and into his arms breaking into a brisk walk for the room. "Stay with me here, Sam." He whispered en route.

Dean set Sam down on the bed and pulled the covers out from under him so that he could wrap them around his little brother's body tucking them in one at a time over his extremely shaky form. He whirled taking in Leah who walked into the room slinging the door closed behind her.

"What's wrong with him...his visions usually like this?" She was beginning to wonder if his vision were always like that if that wasn't why she was here...to somehow find a way to tone them down. Because she had never seen anyone have a vision like that.

"He's going into shock...looks like he's hypothermic...we just need to get him warm. He'll be fine...and no...something at that place did this to him...And what happened to you?" Dean kept tucking and adding sheets and blankets until Sam was swaddled in layer after layer of the material, yet his figure was still trembling beneath it all.

"I blinked into a room that had been bricked off." Leah said quickly as she pulled the house shoes she had thankfully been wearing in the bathroom from her feet followed by her socks and began to unknot the shirt that Dean had given her. Her words mirrored the mask that she had perfected since a few months since these jaunts began. The fear was gone...shielded by the present condition of her fellow psychic. "It was a bathroom...some where in the same area as the light house...I think...there was a corpse strapped into the bathtub. I've never blinked rapidly like that before...made me queasy...sorry for the show there." She put her unease and shock off on her ability fluctuating wildly and took a measured breath before grabbing the shirt at the bottom and yanking it off over her head.

Dean starred at her as if she had gone nuts. She was good at faking ease and the undressing only got his curiosity up. She reached for the buckle on the pants completely uninhibited by his eyes on her as she kept right on talking like there was nothing in the world wrong with her striping down to nothing right there. In fact she was picking up the pace. Dean pulled his hand to the back of his head and scratched at his hair his mouth hanging open before he finally had to ask. "What are you doing?"

"Helping your brother." She shrugged it off like it was nothing as she suddenly slipped right past Dean and pulled the blankets back sliding under the blankets without pause. She wrapped her arms around Sam's body and tucked the blankets back in around her before turning to face Dean. "Body heat works faster." She smiled at him. "So whatever made me blink like a mad monkey probably effected Sam's vision too. Whatever's there effects psychics and not you ordinary every day types."

"I don't know I was still pretty freaked out and it takes a lot to unnerve me." Dean almost envied Sam had he still not been so terrified for him. He'd known the girl for all of a couple of hours and she was in bed with him naked...Dean smiled to himself...poor sap probably wouldn't even remember it. Dean's smile slowly faded into a sigh of relief as he saw the color returning to Sam's cheeks. He felt like they had dodged a bullet and he wasn't sure that it was over. He wasn't sure about anything right now...nothing at all.

Dean sank into the chair next to the window listening to Leah go on as her voice fell to the back of his mind...he wasn't really listening as he slowly tried to figure out what had happened back there. One minute Sam and Leah had both been fine...then wham after they had seen whatever they had seen...both of their abilities went nuts...into some kind of flux...he noticed Leah shift a bit under the blanket before he finally was brought out of his thought remembering that he needed to get Sam's hands wrapped up...hopefully before he woke up. Those missing fingernails were going to hurt. Leah had a handful of the blanket wrapped in her fist as Dean rose to his feet and froze. "Leah?" He asked realizing that she had broken off in mid sentence.

She looked up at him in horror. "Dean." She whispered and then she was gone.


	5. Chapter 5

1Chapter Five

Leah has never blinked prone before...it was amazing - that. She had always been on her feet when a blink came. So it was that when she felt the warmth of the blankets and the temperature in the room left her and she was surrounded a burst of cold she felt her body shudder instinctively before she even had a chance to take in the fact that she was falling.

She caught a glimpse of dozens of rounded light fixtures over head before she felt her arm slam into something solid and then she hit a black rubber mat with enough force to knock the air from her lungs. She lay there a moment in a panic until she could breath again. And finally shifted her gaze to the man that was standing over her...drink in hand.

Leah rolled her eyes very aware that she was in her birthday suite as she reached up with one fluid movement and grabbed a hold of the thick wood of the bar. She pulled herself into a sitting position noticing two pairs of eyes now peering over the other side of the bar at her before she sighed and slowly pulled herself to her feet. Well she had blinked into worse places.

It was a shady bar and pool hall and still had far too many patrons for her liking this early in the morning. She kept her body shielded by the bar leaned down low as she finally looked back to the bar tender standing right beside her with his mouth hanging open. "Right." She breathed to herself. This is where all her raising came into play...that or high school drama - she wasn't sure which helped her more. At any rate it wasn't hard for her to work up the tears as she conveniently made sure the black and blue of her arm was showing. 

She had a few things working in her favor things she meant to exploit. No man liked to admit that he didn't know what was going on...and a girl falling from thin air didn't make sense tot he rational mind. Also the only witnesses that had been paying attention had been drinking all night...so their brains were pliable. And so as she worked the tears into a gurgling sob she said in a rush. "Didn't you see that guy?" They looked to her in shock as she continued. "He..he...he attacked me in the bathroom...he..Oh my God..." Half fake near faint and the bartender was helping her to a chair draping the only thing he had to cover her with...his apron...joy... "He just ran out the door after I ran out and made it to the bar." That got rid of the two stumps at the bar. They had to prove their manliness by going after her elusive attacker. The bartender though was pouring up a shot as she slipped the apron over her head and tied it in the back still doing little to cover her bum. Oh well it was better then nothing. As he sat the shot in front of her she quickly picked it up and downed it's contents. "Could you just send the bottle over here." She coughed on the shot - acting like she wasn't used to drinking to seal this whole masquerade. He gave her a sympathetic smile and passed her the bottle as he reached for the phone to call the police about this guy that had attacked her.

Leah hoped she blinked again before they got there. 

OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

Sam pulled himself into a sitting position in the bed and drew his knees up to his chest as he wrapped the blanket around him tighter. Dean had been to the vending machines and happily returned with the only source of coffee that didn't involve him having to drive. Vending coffee usually sucked...but Sam didn't care at the moment as the heat was what he was going for.

Dean had already filled him in on Leah disappearing from the room a half hour ago and he could tell Dean was worried silly. Sam was worried to...and scared. He'd never get used to a first time experience with one of his visions. Firsts were the hardest...but these weren't some progression to what his abilities were supposed to be...these were like tainted visions...things better left unexperienced. An as of yet he didn't know what to do with it. 

"You think you can talk about it?" Dean slowly sank into the chair sweat dripping down his forehead from where he had been sitting next to the heater vent. He had already discarded his coat and over shirt and now he was fanning himself with a phone book. He had given Sam a generous amount of space since he'd woken up to his finishing up wrapping up his finger tips.

Sam nodded taking another long sip of coffee as he pulled the blanket even tighter around him. "Yeah...I uh was in a bathtub. There were metal straps bolted into the porcelain holding my legs and arms. A man was filling the bathtub with water and ice. I was living the vision from the victims perspective...evidently to the full extent of actually succumbing to the same condition that he/she died from. It wasn't a vision of the future, Dean. I don't know how I know, but it felt like this had already happened. There was some thing else though." Sam narrowed his eyes fighting the blinding pain in his head to remember something he thought he may have imagined. "I wasn't the only person there...And I mean victim...the killer got quiet on several occasions and I could hear voices and weeping outside the bathroom door."

Dean listened slowly leaning forward to rest his elbows on his knees as his heart continued to sink at each passing bout of information that Sam was revealing. Dean let his hands roam his face in exhaustion and then finally let his hands move out and away from his body as he began to try to piece this together. "So...you didn't have a vision...you relieved a past experience...that involved some psycho killing you in a bathtub...sounds like the room that Leah blinked into. She said she blinked into a bricked up bathroom with a corpse in the tub. Thought it was near the light house...but your sure that there were other people there? Could they still be alive?"

Sam met his eyes with a hard swallow. "I don't know. How decomposed was the corpse?"

"She didn't get a chance to tell me before she blinked." Dean replied looking to the door as if she was going to walk in any minute. They were both silent for a long moment. "She's been gone a while."

"God who knows where this thing took her this time...I guess that means that it didn't end when we walked out the light house gates." Sam downed the rest of the coffee and set the cup down on the night stand before covering himself back up, drawing his knees in closer to his chest. "We've got to dig up the history of that place."  
"What about that last caretaker...he disappeared two years ago...people thought he was crazy...could he be our guy?" Dean thought out loud as he brought Sam his computer. He looked to Sam's finger tips with a grimace realizing that it was going to be slow going in typing.

"I don't think so." Sam shook his head. "But it's worth looking into. I still don't know which spirit gave me the vision though...I mean I know there is an evil one there...and if there is an evil spirit then is it possessing others to do the killing...or is it the killer himself...and if the killer is dead...then all of those people I heard..." Sam broke off with a swallow.

"Are dead too...so you think the victims could be asking for justice here. I don't know many victims that would make you live their death...and near kill you in the process."

"I don't know Dean...killer - victim...we've got to find out which and stop this before I have one that I don't recover from so quick." Sam watched the worry sink in as Dean met his eyes.

If this was recovering quick then Dean didn't want to see what else was in store for them. "We may need some help here." Dean hated to admit it. But he wasn't about to let Sammy die on this one...and he was terrified of what was to come. "I mean I don't even know where to begin to find Leah and who knows what kind of shape she's going to be in when she gets back in here. And you're right...I don't know if your visions are back to normal or not...so it's going to be hard for me to rely on you to help close this thing out. I guess I should have said I'm going to need help. Someone about as far from psychic as they can get...to help with the research and can handle themselves. I mean lets face it...we were barely able to dig up what we did on the last caretaker of that place...town seems a little re miss to air the dirt about this one so far as I can tell."

"You should call whoever you feel comfortable with...Bobby maybe?" Sam nodded slowly.

"I was actually thinking about seeing what Ash could dig up." Dean knew Ash was closer...though he trusted Bobby more. "Man I wish he could run an algorithm to find Leah." Dean sighed shaking his head. "God if the last blink had her in a bricked up bathroom..."

"I know." Sam swallowed.

Dean has just walked to the edge of the bathroom when Leah suddenly appeared in the middle of the room in mid laugh. He cocked his head with a "Huh" as he took in the green apron that bore "Spankey's Pool Hall" across the front of it, the bottle of rum in her right hand...and the shot glass in her left.

"Ha." She beamed at the two of them. "I didn't spill it." She downed the shot her smile growing and then dizzily made her way to the chair Dean had just risen from. "You look better." She smiled at Sam.

Dean and Sam exchanged a glance before both of them looked back to her in disbelief. "I'd ask where ya went...but I guess the apron says it all." Dean said in wonder.  
"Hey that has never happened to me before...I don't know why I was there...but I had to do some fast talking to keep the police out of how the hell I showed up behind the bar in all my glory. So bite it back, boy. This wasn't as much of cake walk as you think it was. I'd like to see you get thrown into that situation in your birthday suite and come out that clean." 

"I'm sure you would." Dean threw back at her defensively. He was glad she was alright but upset that she had already picked up the thought that there was some amount of goofing off going on while Sam was in a bad way. He had to remind himself that she couldn't control these jaunts.

"Ha." She couldn't believe his nerve.

"You were naked?" Sam scrunched his eyebrows together realizing that Dean had left that part out of the original explanation of Leah's disappearance. 

"What Dean didn't tell you?" Leah rose to her feet looking for her discarded and borrowed clothes from earlier. She found them shoved just under the foot of the bed as she met Dean's eyes unflinching. She finally sighed as he seemed to be backing down a little and looked back to Sam as she pulled the pants on quickly. "Yeah I was naked. I was trying to use my body heat to warm you up...you were a little out of it. No offense, but it was strictly platonic."

"Huh." Sam nodded at a loss for words.

"On a better note...Sandy Parker." She pulled the apron off so that she could get into the shirt again. "She was the first person to disappear from the pool hall...but not the last. She disappeared twenty years ago and was followed by about a dozen other disappearances all over town...men...women...then it all just stopped. About ten years ago...just nothing. None of the victims were found. Funny the things you learn about violence in small towns...when you tell a bar tender you were attacked. They always want to make you feel like it could have been worse."

She smiled at Dean and finally got an uneasy smirk from him as he shook his head. "You are trouble." he chuckled.

She held up the bottle of rum. "Not arguing." 


	6. Chapter 6

1Chapter Six

Sam carried the computer to the table as well as the blanket that was wrapped around him as he sank into the hard backed chair and began to type with a pain laced wince every few key strokes. Leah was in the bathroom getting cleaned up and Dean was pacing the room talking to Ash.

"Nah...nah the Bounty Light house at Greenburg. No the town is Greenburg...yeah the one in Virginia..." Dean's voice was laced with annoyance as Sam let the sound lull him into security. "Yes on the coast...Dude, it's a lighthouse!" Dean momentarily covered the receiver with his hand looking to Sam. "MIT my ass."

Sam chuckled as he began his own search listening to the singing coming from the bathroom. "I told you to call Bobby." Sam whispered punching a few more keys. HazelGrove gazette appeared on the screen and he started looking to the back logs knowing that they would have to go to the library to find the older additions. They only had the last four years archived online. "It's almost 9:00. I'm going to get cleaned up and run with Leah the police department see if we can't get those police files on the missing persons cases she found from the bar. You think being the normal everyday Joe you can check out the light house? I think you're immune to whatever is there."

Dean looked up from the phone and met Sam's eyes. "I'm not sure I want you two alone together or apart." Dean arched an eyebrow in protest to Sam's plan.

"You scared we might have some fun?" Sam chuckled.

"No I'm scared I'm going to lose my brother and get some innocent girl killed. You two can't control your abilities right now. And the last thing we need is for you to pass out at the police station or her to blink out of the cops lobby. In fact you two probably don't even need to leave this room." Dean paused a moment. Then spoke into the phone. "Yeah...e-mail those lists to Sam."

"I can't guarantee no leaving the room!" Leah called from the bathroom.

"Yeah yeah yeah." Dean muttered in Leah's general direction shaking his head. He then quickly corrected to Ash on the phone"No..no..no" Dean said into the phone. "I do not want that e-mailed...no I'm sure it's lovely...no...Ash...alright. Thanks dude."

"Calling Bobby?" Sam asked as he watched Dean flip the phone closed then instantly open it again.

"Yeah." Dean nodded. "Ash is e-mailing you a list of the former owners of the light house and the missing persons reports. No police department." Dean smiled.

"Great." Sam began to open his e-mail flexing his fingers as he typed off and on to evade the pain for a few moments.

"_I won't do it again!"_ a female voice suddenly screamed out. Sam looked up and around the room seeing Dean pace with his back to him having obviously gotten a hold of Bobby. Leah was still singing in the bathroom so he was sure that if anyone else would have heard it that they would be reacting.

Sam flinched feeling pain begin to wind around his temples. _"Please!"_ Sam felt his breath catch in his throat as his arms slammed into the arms on the chair and were held in place by some unseen bond. "Dean!" He screamed just as he felt his head yanked backwards and his vision began to shift before him.

"I have to make an example. Obviously Sandy wasn't enough of an incentive." It was the same voice from the bathroom and the man was now motioning to the fresh bricks in the doorway to the left. "Everyone watching?"

Sam managed to angle his head downward and he felt his heart sinking into the pit of his stomach. He was bound to a metal chair with metal cuffs and all around the room set up like some sick twisted school house were rows of chairs with other people starring at him...some were crying...some where screaming...hopping around trying to keep from whatever was about to happen from happening. There were men...women...children...All bound and gagged...still the noise from all of the chaos had them all muffling something or another into their gags it was loud...there were so many of them.

Sam met several apologetic eyes as he heard himself sobbing against the killer at his back._ "Please...I'll be good...I'll be so good...please..."_ He felt a bag of plastic being pulled over his head and then taped off at the bottom. Whoever he was in instantly panicked and he felt himself mirroring their actions even though he knew that the faster he breathed the less air he was going to have...the faster he was going to die.

"Everyone watch...if you don't watch - you're next!" The killer was screaming. Sam felt his lungs burning as he tried to see through the plastic memorizing the faces before him...the room...the lack of windows... "Come on freaks- time to pay attention. Did you see this coming Erica?"

A woman broke down in a sob across from him. "Bet you wanted to warn poor Hannah." The killer tormented the woman across from Sam as she watched him dying. "Maybe would have helped you clear your conscience. But we're all cursed...all of us...all evil...all damned...but we can make it all better...we can end this...I can end this...don't you want me to end this?!"

Sam actually saw a few weary nods from across the room. Nods of defeat. Sam suddenly watched the horror of the people across the room from him as the mad man slammed a knife into his chest clearly not understanding anatomy as he went to far to the right for the heart. Sam still arched backwards feeling the blade biting in deep as he sank backwards.

Dean had been pacing filling Bobby in when he heard Sam scream out his name at his back. By the time he turned around Sam was gasping for breath his head pulled back at a weird angle as his hands seemed held fast to the chair. Dean didn't have time to tell Bobby what was happening as he tossed the phone to the side and ran to Sam with enough noise to get Leah's full attention from the bathroom. Dean had just begun to try and snap Sam out of it when he saw the blood suddenly begin to soak into Sam's T-shirt. "No ...no ...no." Dean yanked the shirt down and starred in horror at the knife wound stuck just between the heart and right lung. The bastard may have nicked the lung. "Dammit." Dean screamed out.

Suddenly Sam collapsed no longer held fast his breathing slowly fading as if he had suffocated. "Sammy?" Dean watched as Sam automatically resuscitated as if the death had only momentarily stopped his heart from beating. Sam drew in one full breath then went slack again. "Leah?!" She was already racing out of the bathroom picking up the first aid kit and running with it to where Dean now was ripping Sam's shirt off so he could get to the wound as quickly as possible.

Leah gasped as she saw it and almost dropped the kit on the table. Dean however was now trying to get Sam back into bed looking over the knife would carefully. God if they had to go to the hospital...Dean pressed the T-shirt he'd just yanked off Sam's body against the wound as Leah motioned to the phone where a voice was urgently requesting information.

"Tell him to get here as fast as he can." Dean yelled at her as he looked back down at his brother out of breath and scared to death...how many more of these vision could Sam live through? He heard Leah relaying the information at hie back as he started to delve into the first aid kit for some sort of help...when the phone suddenly dropped to the floor and Dean turned to see an empty room. "Son of a bitch!" He screamed wondering what the hell else could go wrong.


	7. Chapter 7

1Chapter Seven

There was a small plastic cup of rum sitting on the night stand to the right of Sam. It was only about two shots in the bottom of the glass if Dean was guessing, but he was pretty sure Sam was going to need it once he started this patch job. He had also set a bottle of Ibprofen there having read that if you drank more then three drinks that you should contact a doctor before taking the medication. Since he only poured in two drinks he was pretty sure Sam could take the medicine with the Rum and the extra glass of water he had set aside.

"Sam, I'm really sorry about this." Dean whispered as he closed his eyes before pursing his lips together to show his displeasure in what he was about to do. He had listened to Sam's breathing and so far so good, but the wound was deep. And spiritual weapon or not he couldn't let it get infected.

Dean opened his eyes again and looked to Sam...his eyes closed as his head rested easily against the pillow. He covered Sam's mouth with his left hand and pushed his elbow down over Sam's shoulder while holding the open bottle of the only antiseptic he had available...the alcohol... over the knife wound. He would have given anything for the last of the bottle of peroxide that they had sworn they needed to replace and conveniently forgotten too. "Really, really sorry." Dean whispered.

It was more then the pain he knew he was going to cause Sam. Dean was sorry that he couldn't protect Sam from these visions. He was sorry that Sam had to live through them, sorry that he felt helpless, that Sam felt helpless, that he didn't know how to make it stop. That he couldn't come up with something other then some lame "We'll find away." To reassure Sam with once he was awake. Dean cursed inwardly that he wasn't the all fabled protector that he pretended to be the majority of the time. He would have given anything to fix this for Sam...fixed as in made whole...not as in sewing his brother's chest shut. Dean cursed inwardly at whatever was causing this as he sniffed back his resolve and poured the Alcohol.

The reaction was pretty much immediate. Sam's scream was muffled by Dean's hand until it was reflected in Dean's scream once Sam clamped down on Dean's hand on instinct with a bite that felt like it went straight to the bone of Dean's pinky and ring finger. Dean's scream was finally cut off by a muffled cry as he accidently sloshed the bottle of alcohol against Sam's chest and heard Sam hiss back the next cry looking to his chest in disbelief.

"I can't believe you bit me?!" Dean screamed looking into Sam's teared up eyes as Sam looked at the bottle of alcohol in Dean's hand.

"I can't believe you cleaned that... with that." Sam slammed his fist into the bed still reeling from the pain. Dean reached over and grabbed the rum he had fixed for Sam and downed the whole of the cup in one hit before nudging the glass of water in Sam's direction and motioning with a nod of his head to the Ibprofen all while swallowing the Rum.

"Give me some of the rum." Sam hissed out.

"Fine." Dean gasped out looking to the blood running down his arm from the deep bite marks in his fingers. "You know." Dean swallowed again taking a breath against the pain. "You better be glad that was my left hand or you'd be up a creak, til I could figure out how to sew it up myself." Dean called straight faced as he poured more rum into the cup.

Sam laughed out at the absurdity of that as Dean carried the cup back over to him.

"Have you looked at those lists yet?" Sam asked as he fell back against the bed. Dean cocked an eyebrow like Sam had lost his mind.

"Sam. It's been what ten minutes since your last kill or be killed vision. I haven't really had a chance." Dean knelt down beside sam and took the needle and thread in hand after making sure Sam downed the rest of the rum.

"What about Leah?" Sam looked over to the table expecting to see her then furrowed his brow as he turned his head to take in the bathroom. He didn't hear any singing and Dean only made a face at him as he broke the thread off with his teeth before coating the needle and thread with the alcohol. Dean swallowed quickly.

"She'll be back soon I'm sure." Dean nodded trying to keep Sam calm. He saw the recognition surface in Sam's eyes though. He was too fast for his own good sometimes.

"She blinked again didn't she?" Sam asked in alarm. Dean would have lied but the fact was he wasn't sure what condition she was going to come back in or when so concealing the truth at this point could only hurt in the end.

"Yeah...right after your vision." Dean nodded as he began to sew Sam's wound up. Sam sucked in a deep breath and sniffed back against the pain as he looked to Dean trying to focus on anything but the needle and the thread.

"They're connected."

"What is?" Dean focused on making sure he was sewing tight small stitches watching the rise and fall of Sam's chest.

"The visions and her blinks." Sam hissed out balling up part of the sheet in his fists. "When I had the first vision...the one after the lighthouse she blinked into the coresponding room. Then she blinked into the bar where the same woman...the first victim disappeared from. Now I had a vision of a whole room full of victims that were in a room adjoining the room where Sandy died. It was already bricked up in the vision. Uh the victim that he killed that I was in this time's name was Hannah...so Leah either blinked into the room Hannah died in...the place she was taken from...or her grave site?"

"Well that narrows it down." Dean scoffed pulling the thread tight as Sam winced again. "You could be off with these observations you know." Dean nodded as he continued on sewing up the wound.

"I know...but I don't have much more to go on until I can look over what Ash sent."

"Well I'll have you patched up in a second...but I want you to take it easy." Dean replied as he finished the last stitch. "I'll just bring the computer over here and you can look at the stuff. Then I'm going to order some pizza or something see if I can figure out where Leah is..."

"Sew up your own hand." Sam reminded him. Dean rolled his eyes and looked to his fingers.

"Yeah that too. Remind me to never cover your mouth before I pour alcohol into a knife wound that was caused by a ghostly serial killer."

"You don't know he's a ghost." Sam reminded him with a chuckle.

"You don't know that he isn't..." Dean replied in the same tone.

"True...we don't know much of anything." Sam swallowed the Ibprofen with the glass of water Dean had brought him as Dean went to get his computer for him.

"Well why don't you see if you can narrow that down while I go back here and sew up my fingers." Dean looked to the bathroom as he picked up the first aid kit and the bottle of rum.

"You may have to drive later." Sam reminded him before he could down too much of the rum.

"Yeah yeah yeah." Dean muttered under his breath as he walked into the bathroom and closed the door behind him. He'd be damned if Sam was going to see him let that tear roll down his cheek from the pain.

OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

The air was musty and rotten with a stench of decay and the darkness to cover it all. Leah moaned fighting back a sob of pain as she rolled over on the cold concrete. She had blinked in on the steps one foot above the other and that had been enough to send her into a crumpled roll down the metal and bumpy incline. It was the roll that resulted in the break. She heard it snap - loud in her ear and the pain that radiated up her arm and into her chest had near caused her to get sick and black out all at once. Still she held onto some slim form of consciousness as she felt her right arm from the elbow spin against the concrete when she tried to prop herself up on it.

She fought back a groan of nausea as she heard the elbow grind against the other splintered bone and collapsed to the ground fighting to stay conscious once more. If the pain wasn't enough the blacked out window and spinning light from the light house that illuminated shadows every now and again seemed to near drive her into her minds blackness before she swallowed the bile rising in her throat and pushed herself up with a groan with her left arm. She sat there panting against the dust and cobwebs in pitch black...waiting for the next rotation to illuminate the room.

There was a moment of reprieve as she breathed deeply fighting the war with her stomach knowing there couldn't be much left in there when the light shown through the speckled dots that the paint had missed on the windows.

Leah felt her breath catch in her throat as she sat perfectly still watching the dancing pin pricks of light flow through the expanse of a room and lit up every dusty corpse still strapped silently into their seats. The light dwindled again leaving her with that panicked first image to fuel a growing terror with in her heart. She waited near holding her breath for the next flash of light to confirm what she prayed she hadn't just seen.

Unfortunately by the next pass of the light house's light the room was illuminated again this time long enough for her to count them all. Leah took in the twelve figures with a heavy heart as she realized that everyone of Sam's would be missing persons was probably chained to a metal chair in this dusty room...and had been for years. There were men and women...young and old all succumb to the years of death's grip on their bodies so that distinguishing between the subtle differences was difficult. Leah felt a sob rise up behind the panic as when the next light's beam graced the room she found one of the figures standing before the light left again plunging her into darkness.

Leah choked on the sob that she had been about to release and held her breath to scared to even force a limb to respond to her need for escape. She was sitting there head back against the support beam by the time the light was there again and the figure was standing before her having broken off his brittle wrists to get free of the chair. She let out a whimper as she noticed all the others standing now. "Oh God." She breathed. "Time to go." She whispered to herself...having never successfully initiated a blink.

It was dark again though...dark and she was scrambling backward with her good arm screaming out as the bad one folded under her again. No no...She fervently grasped at air as she tried to find something to use to pull her body along the stairs to get her some distance from these things...these former people...former victims of some mad man. She didn't know what they wanted but she was hoping like hell it wasn't revenge...at least not at her. She hadn't been the one that had locked them down here...

There was a sound behind her before the next wave of light flooded the room that sounded like a gaggle of bulemics trying to outdo each other. She turned around slowly in terror just in time to see all the bodies standing at the steps below her trying to talk, but not finding much in the way of vocal cords for their efforts. Leah scrambled up a few more steps before one of them followed and the darkness fell again. By the time she had climbed another step the light was back and the corpse was right on top of her...literally falling on top of her...Leah screamed feeling a rush of cold sweep through her as the blink came on and she tumbled into Dean's bed screaming as her broken arm slammed into the mattress.


	8. Chapter 8

1Chapter Eight

Dean had stripped out of his shirt to avoid the blood and was already soaking the blood on the garment out of it in the bathtub as he used the sink to run water of his fingers...over the horrible looking stitches from a shaky hand and blurred vision. Damn, bites were nasty. He finally blinked and wiped at his eyes giving his hand another look before he sighed and reached for the door, his hand pausing on the doorknob.

There wasn't a question about who was helping who anymore. They all needed all the help they could get by now...and it cut Dean to the core that this wasn't adding up yet. That light house...they had barely stepped through the gates before whatever it was had taken hold inside Sam and Leah. And what little they had been able to put together between Sam and Leah's abilities was now painting a portrait that Dean sure as hell didn't want to look at save to burn it to the ground. Still he wiped the fear from his face before turning the knob. Just because he didn't have any peace didn't mean he wasn't going to walk out of this room looking like he knew for a fact that things were going to work out.

He was about to push the door open when he heard Leah scream and a thump. Dean shoved the door open taken a measured sigh, not sure of what he would find before he stepped into the midst of the hotel room and looked to the still form on his stripped bed. Sam was trying to move his computer off his lap so that he could get up and Dean quickly put a stop to that. "I've got her." Dean whispered.

Dean made his way around the bed wondering if she was unconscious as she lay there still as could be, blood slowly coating her arm around the elbow as it soaked into the mattress cover beneath her. Dean gently eased his body onto the bed beside Leah, careful not to jostle her. He was about to reach out to her when he heard her muffled sob into the bed. Well she was awake...

"Leah?" She didn't move. He heard another sob, this time louder before he let his tongue dart against his lips trying to decide what to say or do at the moment. "Hey...it's alright. You're back in the room. Just me and Sam." Dean whispered softly as he looked to where the blood was coming from...his mind was running in circles - trying to come up with how injured she was.

"We're all dead." Her voice was barely recognizable still muffled by the mattress.

"Hey don't talk like that. We're not even remotely dead. We are going to find out what happened and put an end to this." Dean was surprised he could fake that much confidence. He was over confident to a flaw on most days, but the last 24 hours so far had been enough to test that resolve.

"Everything's going to be alright." Sam piped in his slow typing having ceased the moment that Leah had reappeared. "This will all be over soon."

"Guess you're not used to this kind of job." Dean smiled softly thinking of how ready she was to jump into this when she had first arrived. He could see through her confidence probably as easily as she could see through his though and this was not what she was used to...not even close.

"He can make it stop." Leah's voice suddenly cut a chill through the air as she put weight on her broken arm and without even a hint of pain pushed her body upward. Dean's eyes focused on the twisted limb as it creaked and crunched from her movement his stomach rolling from the sound and the utter lack of pain on her face as she rolled to a sitting position until she faced the two of them. Dean cursed under his breath as he saw that her eyes were completely grayed over.

It wasn't typical blackness from demonic possession. No, this was something else. Dean rose to his feet on the opposite side of the bed as he heard Sam shifting from his position having seen it too. "Sam, don't you move." Dean warned not about to risk his brother getting further injured. "Who can make it stop?"

"Donovan." She half laughed out in an insane sort of pain ridden chuckle. "The man with the yellow eyes said he failed, Donovan, but now he's the only one left."

Dean almost couldn't get the next question out as he heard her say yellow eyes. "Yellow eyes?" He changed his direction in mid stammer as his eyes widened. It was like she was channeling one of the victims, but the mention of the demon was hardly anything he was expecting. Dean swallowed waiting for the answer.

"Forget about him!" She screamed out all at once the mental angst and anger playing into the scream that tore through her body. "You have to find Donovan!" There was a flicker to the air around her and there was suddenly a girl bolted to a chair interposed over her body her mouth gagged as she struggled against her bonds, tears streaming down her face.

"Whose Donovan?" Dean called back looking from the figure in the chair to Leah. Both of them occupying the same space. He thought he heard Sam whisper a muffled gasp that resembled something like "Erica." at his back.

"We're all dead..." She whispered again.

"No...no." Dean clenched his good fist shaking his head in anger and frustration. " Come on stay with me...whose Donovan...if you want us to find him...you gotta give me something!" Dean called back.

"Donovan's hand are covered in blood...he can make it stop."

"Blood...wha...Make what stop?" Dean called out his voice bordering on a scream of absolute aggravation that spirits couldn't just say what they meant sometimes!

"This."

"Hell of an explanation." Dean breathed as he suddenly saw the girl in the chair's image fade and Leah started to pitch forward. Dean dove across the bed to catch her before he injured arm could hit the bed again. Before he eased her back down though he pulled the wisps of blonde hair from her face and pulled back an eye lid making sure that there was white there instead of gray.

"You got those lists up yet?" Dean breathed over his shoulder to Sam.

"Dean...the demon had his hand in this..." Sam whispered. "What the hell is going on?"

"I don't know." Dean swallowed keeping his back to Sam, hoping like hell that his brother couldn't see the fear in his eyes. "Is there a Donovan - anything on there?"

"Yeah." It took Sam a long time to answer. "Donovan Cook. He's the current owner's son. He's in a mental hospital about an hour from here. Has been for the last twenty years or so."

"That's when all of this started." Dean whispered. "Leah said the first disappearance was twenty years ago. Sandy...the first vision you had. So how the hell could this Donovan play into it?" Dean heard a flurry of key strokes at his back.

"Well he was admitted the same day Sandy disappeared. The other disappearances are scattered over the next ten years. Dean..." Sam swallowed thickly as he looked to the pages before him...one after another ...of all the missing. "There were over thirty five missing. They called in the FBI...they turned this whole town upside down. Checked out everyone. The missing were travelers...towns folk. People from everywhere...no pattern. Men...women...children. Whoever..however...there was no way to track this sicko's movements.

"Thirty five?" Dean gasped as he turned to meet Sam's eyes. "You're telling me they never caught anyone?"

"Oh they caught someone." Sam nodded. "But I'm pretty sure it was just a fall guy to get everyone off their back. What they had was circumstantial and even that was a stretch to hold him...but they did. He died the night they arrested him...in lock up. Closed cell...no roommate...found him on the floor the next morning...they think he had a heart condition. "

"Were there any ties to the lighthouse? I mean did any of the investigations lead them in that direction?" Dean wondered as he slowly began to look Leah's arm over again.

"Nothing...about the only thing on the light house besides a couple of man of the year nods to old man Cook was that caretaker going missing a few years back. And they never found a trace of him."

"Alright. We need to check on the current caretaker and pay Donovan a visit." Dean sighed as he saw Leah's elbow poking out of her skin. "But we've got to get her to the hospital first. I think she's going to have to have surgery on that arm."

"What if she blinks out of the hospital...Dean in my first vision her arm was broken...and I mean not in an I've been to the hospital - got a cast sort of way. The elbow was busted through the skin." Sam hadn't even gotten a good look at her arm yet and Dean was already sucking in a this couldn't get much worse breath.

"Well congratulations Sam...she's got the injury...now we just have to keep the damn vision from coming true." Dean rose to his feet wondering what it was Sam wanted him to do. He couldn't fix her arm. Sam couldn't fix her arm and they couldn't just let her bleed to death in the hotel room.

"I'm just saying...the chances of her blinking again before you get to the hospital are high..."

"That means you have another vision coming too...right?" Dean picked up on it almost at the same time as Sam who was slowly nodding. "Great."

"We've got to end this." Dean shook his head sucking in a breath as he looked to the clock on the all in annoyance. "Bobby is on his way, but he's still four hours out. If what your saying about the hospital is true then we don't have time to wait." Dean walked to one of his bags in the floor and pulled a fresh shirt from it before looking to Leah who was stirring on the bed. Dean tossed the shirt to Sam.

"What are you doing?" Sam asked looking to the shirt Dean had just tossed him as Dean was pulling a black one over his head.

"We're going to the light house." Dean breathed glad that the sun was shining now.


	9. Chapter 9

1Chapter Nine

WARNING - Semi-graphic torture scene

"We're what?" Sam looked over to Dean's bed as Dean walked to Leah and checked her arm over.

"Look you two keep having some reaction to the victims not the killer...Leah said she thought that you guys were close to the light house and didn't you say that you saw the light house beam from the room you were in when Hannah died? That means the victims spirits are near the light house and they are the ones reeking havoc on you two...we find them - salt and burn and then figure it out." Dean grabbed a pair of scissors from the first aid kit cutting a few t-shirts into pieces before wrapping Leah's arm securely enough to keep it from bleeding and then securing it to her body so that it wouldn't move. That was the best he would do without medical help.

She was finally actually looking up at him by the time he finished. "Hey." Dean smiled down at her glad that all the movement hadn't woken her up enough to get much screaming out of her. He saw the alarm enter her eyes as she suddenly remembered everything that had just happened. "It's alright." Dean met her eyes wondering if the spirit was still holding on inside her, trying to claw it's way to the surface...or if it was gone.

"No it's not." Leah breathed wincing against the pain that hitched in her chest when she looked down her body to her arm. She swallowed closing her eyes a moment and then took another measured breath as she looked back up to Dean forcing a weak smile with tears laced in every movement. She licked at her lips not able to meet his eyes for long. "This is not alright. If I could leave...If I could go home...no offense..."

"None taken." Dean replied quickly as he looked over his shoulder to Sam to see him putting his shirt on. "Look we're going to the Light house to see about getting rid of these spirits before you blink again...or Sam..."

"Has another life altering experience." Leah finished for him pushing herself into a sitting position trying to get used to the pain wavering through her. "Yeah...sounds like a plan." She finally whispered.

"Dean, I just..." Sam protested with a hiss to his voice as he fought the ache in his chest. "Something isn't right about all of this."

"You got that right...which is why we're going." Dean replied with a scoff wondering why Sam was so reserved to the idea.

"Did I tell you what I saw?" Leah asked softly unsure of the last few moments in the room. She remembered talking...but not what she said. It was strange to say the least.

"Not in so many words...care to share?" Dean got to his feet and walked to the duffle in the floor preparing their supplies for this trip.

"There was about twelve people in chairs...it was dark...but the light house beam kept shining in. They were uh...moving..." She broke off her calm normal sarcasm far removed from this conversation.

"Like kinda flickering in and out...trying to talk or hurt you?"Dean nodded loading the rock salt into the gun.

"No...the actual bodies. They had to break their hands off to get to me...and then...it was like one of them was trying to...she...wanted..."

Dean froze and looked over his shoulder first meeting Sam's eyes then looking to Leah in confusion. "Wanted what?" Sam was the one who asked as he made his way over to help Dean with the guns.

"To uh...get inside me." Leah didn't know how to explain it. She had seen ghosts...these weren't like any ghosts she had ever seen though. "What was inside that thing...not the actual body...most of them couldn't get out of that circle though...they were trapped at the bottom of the stairs."

"Circle?" Dean and Sam asked in unison the alarm in their voices all too apparent.

"Yeah on the floor. All the chairs were in it."

"Leah what did the circle look like?" Dean asked rising too his feet carefully as he watched her shudder from the recent memories.

"I don't know." She called out betraying the edge to what was left of her control. "I was trying to get out of there...I wasn't paying much attention to it. They couldn't leave it though...none of them except that one...and I think she was fighting pretty hard to have accomplished that. I think I actually broke the chalk lines where she crossed while I was trying to pull myself up the stairs."

"That doesn't make any sense." Sam whispered. "Who needs a binding circle to hold spirits? And I mean it's not like they were bound...they still got in our heads...Demons are the only thing I know of that you can use those on."

"Well they were bound...emphasis on the word _were_." Leah nodded as she moved to inspect the guns Dean and Sam were both now holding sort of away from them as they reevaluated the situation.

"Maybe we should wait for Bobby." Sam said softly at a loss for what they were up against one again.

"Yeah maybe...if keeping you two alive weren't a factor." Dean scoffed. "Come on Sam get your socks and shoes on...we need to get moving."

Sam looked to his feet with a sigh. "Dean..."

"Sam we're going...now get your shoes on!" Dean called back. "Leah you need help with anything?" The frustration and anger in Dean's voice reached a crescendo as he fought the urge to hit something. This hunt was in a league of it's own and the fatality rate was way to high for him to deal with at the moment. All he could think about was they had to stop the next vision and blink.

"Sam?" Dean stopped when he realized Sam had dropped to sit in mid air like there was a chair there...where there was none. "Dammit!"

Sam was perched there as if his arms were pinned to some arm rests on a chair his feet spread out on the floor before him. His face locked in panting terror.

Sam's vision flickered in and out again until the cold stonewalls came slamming into crystal clear clarity. He was in a metal chair again...it was another victim though and she was craning her head to the side looking to the two dark figures in the doorway as she panted in terror. He caught the glint of yellow eyes from the man doing the majority of the talking. "You break her down and let him get control...I don't care how long it takes!"

"She's gonna die if I keep pushing her." The other man retaliated...the killer. "She's already been through the electro shock and the ice baths...she's been in this room for four days without food...I think we're reaching the thresh hold here. She should have turned already!"

"That doesn't look like turned to me! Now you find a way to weaken her mind so my minion gets control of her body...or I'm going to take this to someone more capable." Yellow eye's voice fell softer making it seem more terrifying. "Do you understand me?"

"Yes sir." The killer reluctantly replied. And like that yellow eyes was gone. The killer rounded on Sam with a sigh as he picked up a small ball-peen hammer from a tray of other devices. Sam felt himself screaming into the gag against his weak lips as he watched the man kneel before him.

"You know I can make it all stop...well you can...you can make it stop. Just say the word...let him have the control...and this will all be over."

Sam felt his body yell a "Go to hell." Into the gag and wholeheartedly agreed with the victim he was residing in. The killer sighed again and held up the small rounded hammer.

"Don't say I never gave you a chance." He raised the hammer over her foot and as his hand fell...

Dean took a momentary step back as Sam's head arched backward in a muffled cry as Dean watched one of his toes turn awkwardly with a crack as an indentation slammed into it. "Son of a..." Dean trailed off as the next toe did the same thing. The next crack sent a wave of nausea wavering through Dean as he hurried to Sam knowing even in his lack of success before that he had to bring his brother out of this. "Sam!" Dean screamed taking hold of his shoulders. Sam didn't even seem to her him though.

Crack.

"God Sam." Dean looked to his completely ruined left foot hearing a sob escape from the muffled sounds coming from Sam. Dean shook him hard and felt the give of whatever he was siting in, but he didn't come back to him. "SAMMY!"

Crack.

The bastard had started on the other foot. And Dean had the sick sinking feeling that he was going it have to wait it out. Finally, with tears lining his eyes in horror and pain for his brother Dean did the only thing he could. He wrapped his arms around Sam and leaned his head against Sam's, his mouth right next to his ear. "Sam, you hold on. I'm here - you hear me." Dean's voice was chocked with frustration and tears. "Do not let him win...you hang on." Dean closed his eyes hearing another crack and felt Sam's body shudder against him. "Hang on Sammy." he repeated against Sam's sobs against whatever was in his mouth in the vision.

Leah had covered her mouth sinking to the bed and finally hadn't been able to look any more. She jumped at the next crack and fought a wave of tears as she realized in a panic that she was next...Oh god she was about to blink. She couldn't feel it yet, but it was coming...

Dean felt Sam go slack against him as the last toe on the right foot cracked. "That's it." Dean breathed feeling Sam's chest rise and fall against him...he was out cold...but he was alive. "It's over."

"No it's not." Leah got out in a panic behind him. Dean opened his eyes against Sam's neck breathing in deeply as he caught his brothers body and brought him into his arms to move him to the bed. She was right. But he didn't know what to do to keep her from blinking...into Sam's death vision that had started all of this.

Leah was pacing back and forth at the foot of the bed now obviously trying to come up with some way to save herself. Suddenly she met Dean's eyes as he rose to his feet and turned back to her. Realization surfaced there in her eyes and they widened. She stopped all at once. "Hit me." She breathed out all at once.

"What?" Dean's head snapped up not sure he had heard her right.

"I've never blinked when I've been unconscious...never...hit me...and I don't me some pansy ass holding it back scared your going to hurt me punch...you lay me out! If you hold that punch I swear I am going to come back and haunt you." She got out in a rush.


	10. Chapter 10

1Chapter Ten

Dean knew the instant he made up his mind, but it didn't give him a bit of relief. Sam was a mess...Leah was a mess...and Dean...well he knew himself well enough to know that no matter how rock solid his game face was...that it wasn't going to hold much longer. She needed this. He didn't want to do...she didn't really want him to do it...but as it was looking like their only option, Dean acted. He walked right across the room without giving her time to back up or out and without a single word of warning he did it. Dean's fist connected with Leah's jaw on the right.

He watched her head snap to the left and then her eyes roll back into her head before he caught her in mid fall. He gave himself a half shrug that it had worked first time around because he had actually held back a little. She sagged into his arms before he finally let himself take a breath and he moved her to his still stripped bed. He set her down and looked back to Sam with a heavy sigh.

Dean rubbed a hand over his face and swallowed hard looking to the first aid box. This was getting to be a bitch. He slid into the chair in front of Sam's lap top and opened the box giving Sam another glance. Dean slumped down in the chair wearily and closed his eyes taking in several deep breaths before he looked over the two forms once more. "I should get paid." He mumbled to himself. "Start up a medical practice...settled down somewhere."

He looked to this freshly stitched up hand and furrowed his brow. "Nah they don't pay those guys enough." He knew he was rambling maybe just to hear another voice that wasn't screaming. Well if it worked for Leah maybe being unconscious would work for Sam too. At least until he could figure out another way to make it stop. Dean sat there for God only knew how long trying to get a grip on all of this before he finally eased himself up and to his feet with yet another long sigh in a list of long sighs that mirrored his souls recompense to do what needed to be done. Dean opened the first aid box at the foot of the bed looking to Sam's swelling mass of purpled and red digits.

"I hope you stay asleep for this." Dean whispered. "Cause I am sure as hell not going to let you bite me again...and I don't know how much screaming I can take...not to mention the hotel guests next door...Glad we got the corner room...only have to worry about one set of extra ears." Dean winced placing a finger on Sam's pinky toe of the left foot. "I guess we'll have to take it slow or something... God, Bobby I wish you would hurry it up." Dean looked to the clock over the television set and shook his head. Three hours and Forty - five minutes.

It was a long drive. Dean knew that and Bobby was going out of his way to make it as it was...but Dean couldn't help but want some help here now. Dean took hold of Sam's smallest toe and gave it a soft wiggle trying to gauge where the bone had broken. What he heard and felt though made his stomach rise up into his throat. Dean felt the bones shifting having splintered into several pieces. He needed surgery...maybe some pins...as he examined the others he found them in a likewise fashion. Splintered into so many breaks that it was going to take more then a easy set to fix. Dean finally resolved a different approach. He would wrap them as best he could and dope Sam up as soon as he woke up...at least til he could get him to the hospital. Damn, they were all going to need a hospital soon if this kept up.

Nothing was poking out of the skin so that was a blessing at the very least. Dean stopped several times during the wrapping process as Sam shifted in his agonizing sleep and gave him enough pause to settled back before he began again. It seemed to take an hour to wrap his feet. And by the time he was done Dean felt like someone had hit him in the gut repeatedly...with a baseball bat.

Dean finally took a break and opened his cell phone. He quickly punched in Bobby's cell number and sank down in the bed beside Sam resting half sitting against the headboard as he watched his brother's chest rise and fall evenly.

OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

The lights flickered on and off in the lone room met by eyes that seemed to stare blankly at the ceiling. There was a moment when time froze and the clock over the fresh flowers on the bedside stopped. "I have a problem."

A deep voice met ears that seemed vacant as the figure on the bed didn't acknowledge having seen or heard anything save to give a have gurgled grunt. A dark figure walked around the bed and looked down at the man's face with a tight frown. His yellow eyes met the man's stark blue ones as the demon placed his hand over the man's. "Donovan, time for you to help me again."

Donovan's expression didn't change much save a slight curl at the right side of his lips that almost looked like a smile. "The project that we completed...isn't as concluded as I thought. Like I said...there's a problem." The demon sighed. "The circle is broken...and I need you to kill the person responsible..." he broke off a moment as if he was listening to a reply that never actually became vocal. "Oh no...she's psychic...she's tormented...you can help her end the suffering. She'll be grateful." He paused again as if listening. "No the others will be fine...they are far too weak to create too many problems. I'll deal with them myself...if time permits...if not...the added chaos will only fuel my current efforts...maybe throw a few people off my scent."

There was another long drawn out pause. "I need this taken care of as quickly as possible." the demon nodded. "You think you can find her with this?" he tucked a small piece of torn bloodied fabric from the room he nicknamed 'the burial chamber' into Donovan's hand. The demon smiled as if he had his answer and patted his shoulder. "Good man." he turned and slowly walked from the bed disappearing in the shadows.

OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

Dean frowned as he got the message that Bobby was out of a service area and let out a groan of frustration as he picked up the shot gun that had been tossed to the floor the moment that Sam's vision began. He checked the rock salt he had loaded into it again with a sigh as Sam began to let out a soft groan from the bed. "Sam?" Dean perked up keeping the gun clenched in his hand as he made his way over to Sam's side.

"Dean?" Sam's face conveyed the extent of the pain that Dean wished he could ease. Dean softly sat down beside Sam as his brother's eyes lulled open the skin around them pulled tight in a grimace.

"Hey." Dean couldn't even force a smile as he took in Sam's countenance. "You think you can tell me what you saw while we force some pain meds in you?" Dean asked working to get another set of Ibprofen out. He tried to count how many Sam had had in the last few hours and lost the battle with numbers in his head. He was sure it wasn't going to hurt anything.

"Sonofabitch broke my toes...with a...hammer." Sam grabbed the pills from Dean's hand and popped them in his mouth with a groan as Dean handed him a glass of water to wash it down. There was a long pause where Dean thought that was all he was going to get until Sam finally took a few deep breaths fighting against the agony to speak. "Did she blink?"

"No she..." Dean paused. "She asked me to lay her out instead...said she'd never blinked unconscious...so well we made her unconscious."

Sam wasn't even going to say the first thing that came to mind through the shades of misery that were playing through his system. "The demon was experimenting with them somehow...trying to work on mass possession of psychics."

"You saw all that?" Dean didn't like where this was going...not one bit. Sam's half laugh that was almost followed by a snarl though made him wrinkle his brow in confusion. "Sam?"

"It wasn't working." Sam almost smiled at that much. "The psychics were too strong...no matter how much they tried to break their will...they had demons inside them Dean...and they still had control...the people...not the demons."

"You mean to tell me that they couldn't be demon possessed?" Dean asked trying to make this somehow explain the events that had been unfolding.

"No they were possessed...they just had complete control. And the yellow eyed demon wasn't happy." Sam seemed to be relishing the information as if it fueled his will to remain conscious even though Dean could see that the pain was ripping him apart. Dean was going to suggest Sam relaxing a bit while they took the time to wait for Bobby or took a chance to get to the Hospital...either or was sounding good right about now. "It's like the victims are trying to tell us their story...they just can't control how strong it's coming through."

"You mean to tell me that they can keep a demon in check but can't tone down the message...Sam, that's not reassuring."

"I think the demons are still in their corpses. The spirits are begging us to destroy them so they can rest...turn about being fair play if you were a demon and couldn't leave the person who was suppose to be your victim...then would you let the spirit leave when the body died? I think the psychics trapped the demons inside them and demons are keeping the psychics spirits trapped now. We have to help them."

"That didn't even make sense." Dean shook his head wondering if the killer had hit Sam in the head with the hammer as well. "Dude, did that guy wack you in the head too?"


	11. Chapter 11

1Chapter Eleven

Sam knew Dean was following in his own sort of way even if he was outwardly questioning Sam's coherency at the moment. Sam pushed his head back against the pillow squirming in the bed as if the simple movements were going to ease the burden of torment coursing through his feet and legs. The suffering ran so deep that Sam rode the tides of consciousness trying to stay afloat. His eyes would open and close as he occasionally dipped below the surface and fought his way right back up to be slapped by another wave of torture. "Dean, what part aren't you following?"

"Pretty much all of it." Dean breathed watching Sam struggling with the consequences of some slap happy spirits form of communication. He understood what Sam had explained. He just wished he was wrong. That this wasn't new ground. That all the answers were laid out in black and white with clarity enough to guide him in the right direction. Dean slid his hand over his mouth breathing in soft against his palm as he finally acknowledged the rationality in Sam's thinking. "Sam, how do you exorcize twelve demons at once? I mean that's what we're talking about here. Not only that but they are out of the circle now so it's not like fish in a barrel any more. Even if we find the place...Spirits aside and yeah they should be put to rest...but we have a bigger problem now."

"They're ten year old corpses Dean. How powerful can they be? They're brittle so if they tried to hit anyone..."

"No...They were powerless in the circle, Sam. I think you forgetting here. Once they get back to full strength...brittle bodies or not they are going to bolster that with their demonic powers...so feeble isn't in the cards and then you have to think about the psychic ones. We'll end up pinned to a wall before we can get the first exorcism off." Dean pointed out as he rose to his feet his hand now rubbing at the back of his neck in contemplation and worry. "There's something else bugging me about this though."

"What?" Sam's hand clenched at the blankets as he seemed to be waiting for the pain medication to kick in. Dean noticed him eyeing the rum as he paced a moment and quickly retrieved the bottle.

"Here." He helped Sam sit up a bit, propping him up against the headboard. Dean thought Sam had passed back out a moment as his head lulled back against the board before he jerked and shook his head trying to keep himself awake. Dean pushed the bottle into Sam's hand receiving a grateful nod as he pulled the top off. "There were 35 missing. Where is everyone else?"

Sam paused the bottle to his lips in mid gulp as his eyes met Dean's. Dean retrieved the bottle from Sam watching as he struggled to get the liquor down. Dean kept going though...trying to point out every nagging jigsaw piece that he could think of. "Not only that...but ok so the psychics had control when they were alive...who has control now?...We have no idea what's at that light house and you and Leah can't exactly take much more punishment."

Sam swallowed again with a half nod as he got choked up on the Rum and almost passed out again from the movement against his feet, the aching stitches in his chest, and his still tender fingers from the broken and missing fingernails. "Gotta agree with you there." Sam whispered once he was able to talk again.

Dean pressed his tongue against the inside of his cheek not able to stand watching Sam struggle like this anymore. All he had was a head full of questions and no answers. He wanted to end this and he wanted to let out a powder keg of rage while he was at it...but he had to get them to a hospital. They would sedate them...maybe that would buy him some time. His only reservation was someone having seen his picture plastered all over Tv and turning him before he got the chance to even find a way to end this. That would leave Sam and Leah wide open with no one left to protect them...until Bobby got there.

Dean was hating every available option. "Right." Dean finally got out as he grabbed Sam's bag of clothes and started going through it for an ID. "Uh I need a story...something that isn't going to bring the police in."

"A story?" Sam asked in a slur.

"Yeah for the hospital." Dean nodded.

"I think our condition alone is going to raise enough suspension for questioning, Dean." Sam scoffed as the pain medication and rum from earlier was clearly in his system now. Dean was just waiting for the rest of it to kick in so he could see some relief cross Sam's face.

"Right." Dean nodded pausing only a second to consider that as he removed most of the weapons from Sam's bag.

"Just drop us off." Sam finally got out. "I'll get us in the door...and you'll be out of sight."

"I can't do that." Dean half laughed at the absurdity of that. He wasn't letting them out of his sight.

"Dean, you have to." Sam knew it was true as sure as Dean didn't want to give it credence. "If you get arrested..."

"Then I'll bust out."

"And if you can't."

"I will." Dean replied his voice rising in anger. "Look there aren't any good resolutions here, Sam. Now I'm not letting some half bit doctor who doesn't know what's happening go to town on you and not be around in case the spirits decide to send you another revelation. And someone has to keep an eye on Leah too. If you have a vision...and she blinks...then I have to be there to find out what you saw so I have some clue where to find her or keep someone else from realizing that she is gone. I cannot just drop you two off." Dean's voice kept getting louder the longer that he went on and he finally broke off on the last word his frustration playing into a whole other realm of frustrations that Sam was used to seeing his brother shoulder.

"Dean, you can't do it all." Sam pursed his lips together as he shifted uncomfortably again. "You can't protect me and her and kill them all by yourself."

"I know that!" And that's what was pissing Dean off the most. That he needed someone else. That he really couldn't do this one by himself...that he had to actually rely on some measure of hope and wishes to bring Sam and Leah through this in some way. "Come on. I'm going to get you in the car." Dean had given it enough of a pause as the silence settled over them following his outburst. He needed to just keep moving...keep busting the solutions one at a time.

Leah moaned softly but Dean didn't hear it over Sam's sob choked cry from Dean shifting his brother weight into his arms. He was trying to keep from jostling anything and it wasn't working.

Leah's eyes rolled open in a haze of flashing lights and she instantly yet slowly rolled her bottom lip and muscles of her jaw around in a circular motion bringing her good hand to her face with another moan. Her infinite wisdom was going to get her killed one day...she was sure of that. Right now the solutions seemed to bring as much pain as the problems and she was still a little dazed to play connect the dots as she slowly pulled herself into a sit on the bed.

This was a kicker. Her other jobs related to her blinking, all fifteen of them, were not near so painful. She could count on one hand how many times she actually been threatened by her blinks. Though the number was growing exponentially during this case and what absolutely bugged her the most was that she still didn't know what the hell she was supposed to do to help these guys. Hell she didn't even really know what was going on. And she wasn't sure she wanted to.

"Going somewhere?" Leah whispered and instantly flinched as she felt the pain waver through her jaw.

Dean turned still holding Sam and they both seemed to gasp in unison. "Dammit you got go back under." Dean got out in a rush not sure he could handle it if she suddenly disappeared again.

"Yeah you wanna hit me or ya want Peaches there to." Leah nodded to Sam as she said Peaches and saw his lips turn up at the corner through his own pain at that. "Might make ya feel better." Leah kept on glad to see even the semblance of a smile against Sam's lips after what he had already endured.

"You think you can stay there long enough for me to get Sam in the car?" Dean asked quickly. He really didn't want to hit her again. It was hard enough an hour and a half ago plus he was pretty sure that he was going to do some damage if this kept up. He wasn't sure that he hadn't already done some...but she seemed like her usual semi-psychotic self so far so he wasn't going to question the first knock out yet.

"Isn't there some other way ?" Sam asked looking from Dean to Leah.

"We don't have time to talk it out Sam..if she blinks she dies...that's where we're at. Hell, Leah just run full tilt into the wall - head first...try to keep the arm out of it as much as you can - see if that does the trick...if you can't knock yourself out then I'll hit you when I get back from getting Sam settled into the car...Then we'll all take a ride to the hospital."

"Righto." Leah nodded without even batting an eyelash. Since when did her life involve differing and swift ways to keep herself unconscious? Maybe she could hold her breath? She had a feeling she would wake to quickly if she did that. She looked to the nearest wall with a sigh as Dean leaned down with a groan under Sam's weight to grab Sam's bag as well. "Why me?" Leah whispered to herself closing her eyes briefly as she started pacing off how far back she thought she needed to be to hit the wall hard enough to knock herself out. There was nothing even remotely comforting about this predicament.

"Just aim and bang." Dean called over his shoulder almost wanting to stay and see if she could do it. He really didn't think she would try it. But as she was apparently going so he was curious to see how it worked out. "I'll be right back." Dean called out as she nodded still eyeing the wall wondering if she had what it took to run head long into a wall with the intention of rendering herself unconscious.

Dean turned back to the door as Sam rested his head against his shoulder the act of this move obviously taking it's toll on him. That's when he heard it. The slamming of a body into a wall and the sound of plaster busting loose. Dean couldn't help himself as he was still standing inside the door. He tuned to see Leah with her head through the wall. Her body wiggled a bit against the plaster as she put her good hand against the wall with a groan and he heard the muffled. "It didn't work." That almost got him laughing. Things were too weird for words at the moment though.

Dean arched an eyebrow with a shake of his head instead as he suddenly saw the flicker of a spectral shape taking form next to Leah. "Oh hell." He groaned. "Sam." Dean turned all the way around as he gave Sam as much as an explanation as he could by way of offering him visibility before he heard Sam's gasp and thought it was from the pain.

"That's the guy...the killer." Sam got out between clenched teeth all at once as the spectral form began to solidify. Dean knew Sam would forgive him but he still hated to do it. Dean shifted Sam's weight and took the steps back to the bed in a rush before depositing him back there. He grabbed the shot gun beside the bed and raised it just as the spirit began it's usual spill.

"I can make it stop..." The ghostly form began as his hand moved in Leah's direction, though her head was still safely tucked inside the wall for the moment.

"Hey you Manson wanna be...stop _this_." Dean screamed at him before unloading the rock salt into the bastard.


	12. Chapter 12

1Chapter Twelve

The shot gun blast hit the now completely solid body with enough force to send the killer back against the wall beside a now screaming Leah, who was struggling to yank her head out of the wall with more vigor. The supposed spirit didn't disappear. He looked like he felt it...like it knocked him flat on his ass as he slid down the wall in a dazed stupor.

Dean froze watching the man slowly regain his senses. He wasn't a ghost. Dean cocked the shot gun again looking for something more useful then rock salt now. Sam's weapon stash that he had discarded a moment ago lay scattered between him and the now smiling man before him.

"My turn." The laugh that erupted from the man sent waves of shivers down Dean's spine before Dean felt the mental slap and sailed though the air... connecting with the lone window aside the door. Dean felt the glass crack as the force of his body slammed into it...but it didn't shatter. Dean rolled forward slamming into the floor, catching himself on knees and hands...but not stopping.

Dean slid to cover beside Sam's bed reaching one hand over the edge to grab his brother by the pants leg before wrenching his whole body over the side. Sam hit the floor hard beside him and screamed out as Dean heard the click of a safety being released. "Stay here." Dean whispered to Sam, though he doubted that Sam could have moved if he had tried. "What are you?" Dean called over the side of the bed as he took the knife from his ankle and sniffed back the wave of torment wavering through his back.

"God's right hand." Came the insane reply as the bullets began to tear into the bed.

Dean covered Sam as he stayed down low feeling the filling from the mattress spray against him as bits of the blankets sheets and bedding rained down on them. Chunks of wood from the head board were dodged with ease as Dean cursed under his breath and waited for the killer's need to reload or at least some reprieve to the shots.

Dean heard the click of the gun as the last bullet hit the floor near his foot. He had been gauging the man's position from the last reply. Dean didn't hesitate. As soon as the click sounded like an echoing wave in his ears he pushed hard against straining thighs to get enough momentum to pop over the bed and turn all at once. No sooner had he rounded did he take in the room and the killer while simultaneously loosing the knife. It sailed from Dean's deft fingers straight for the man's throat.

The killer's face registered the realization and fear in a mere fraction of a second before the knife buried itself into his throat to the hilt. Dean heard nothing but Leah and Sam's own horrified gasping as the man fell to the floor slowly...the light leaving his eyes as his body seemed to evaporate before Dean's eyes...the knife dropping to the floor with a clink against the other weapons there. "I hate this case." Dean murmured taking in the blood on the knife and the satisfaction of possibly having killed the man. Disappearing bodies didn't give him as much comfort as seeing the results of the kill...the relief of knowing that a monster was dead. This man may not have been some creature from hell...maybe he was just a psycho under the reign of a demon...either way though...he deserved to die. Dean just hoped that he was gone for good...though he didn't have time to ponder on that.

"We have to get out of here." Sam called from the floor his breath coming hard as he was trying to get to his feet, struggling to pull himself up against the battered bed. Dean was already packing though. "Someone had to have called the police."

"I know." Dean called back as Leah finally emerged from the wall looking white as a sheet. "Leah help me get this stuff in the bags." He screamed at her watching her shaky nod as she quickly complied. "We don't have time to wipe our prints." Dean breathed as he zipped up one bag and slung it over his shoulder moving onto the next. Leah was working with her good arm as fast as she could matching his fervent pace as Sam finally pulled himself to his feet and nearly pitched forward onto the wasted bed. He propped himself up there and leaned the majority of his weight onto his heels. Before trying to take a step and finally hitting the floor.

"I said to stay there, Sam." Dean called out cursing again as he slung another bag onto his shoulder. He made his way to his brother slamming the lap top shut before taking it and sliding it into Sam's computer bag. Dean pulled that bag under his arm, stuck his car keys in his mouth, and then hefted Sam's body with a pain laced groan pulling his half conscious brother over his less laden shoulder before turning in a circle around the room to make sure that he hadn't missed anything.

Sam's head hit the light hanging over the small table there and Sam screamed at Dean before Dean muttered a not so sincere apology around the keys in his mouth, his panic to get them all out of there overriding everything else.

Leah was standing in the center of the room looking to a large pool of blood in the floor where the knife had fallen, the stack of missing persons folders tucked under her arm...the bathroom over night bag slung over the same shoulder. Leah immediately moved for the door in a rush. Dean followed with Sam.

As Leah climbed into the back seat Dean began to toss her the bags from his other arm before slowly placing Sam into the passenger seat. Dean didn't even look over the two passenger before yanking the keys from his mouth and running around the other side of the car. He slid into the drivers seat and looked back to the room with a deep breath before cranking the car and pulling out swiftly.

"Where are we gonna go?" Sam asked looking behind them as several police cars drove past them.

"The hospital." Dean replied without missing a beat.

"Dean...the cops are going to connect this." Sam panted moaning as he shifted against the seat.

"Well we'll deal with that when it happens." Dean swallowed...not sure of what else to do. Sam and Leah both needed medical attention...as soon as he could get it for them. Dean pulled out his cell phone and tossed it to Sam. "Call Bobby."

Dean quickly lifted his bottom out of the seat and pulled his wallet from the back pocket there to get the ID he had used while they had been in this town. He slid the card from the pocket wiping it on his shirt before tossing it out the window. That alias was blown to kingdom come. "Lift up." Dean called to Sam quickly as Sam was just finishing Dialing Bobby's number.

Sam put the weight on his heels and did as Dean requested so that Dean could get to his wallet. Dean did the same thing with Sam's Id then tossed the wallet back into Sam's lap.

"Bobby." Sam suddenly got out as Dean heard a low hello and he craned his neck in Sam's direction half way to see him wincing while trying to keep his voice steady. "Where are you? ...What How?" Dean noticed Sam's eyes glance to the clock on the cell phone

"What is it?" Dean asked realizing that Leah had grown awfully quiet in the back seat though he didn't have time to deal with it at the moment.

"He's on the outskirts of town." Sam whispered. "No...don't go to the hotel. We're on the way to the hospital."

There was a long pause. "Uh...gotta a girl with an open fracture...possible concussion...and me...uh...a little bit of finger damage... knife wound that's been stitched and ten broken toes."

There was another pause as Dean wondered what Bobby was thinking now...he'd barely been able to even start on what was going on since his first conversation with him. "Leah you alright?" Dean asked getting worried at the quietness in the back seat now.

"I'm fine." She called back with a little too much enthusiasm. Dean arched a look in the rearview and saw her press the bottle of Rum to her lips again as she turned the bottle back.

"Yeah we can do that." Sam nodded slightly as he answered whatever question that Bobby had asked of him before flipping the phone down signifying the end of the conversation. "He said to meet him at Harper road about a mile South of town before we head to the hospital...if no one was bleeding to death."

"Right." Dean nodded glad he was already heading south. "Leah take it easy on that...they'll probably dope you up when we get to the hospital."

"Right." She mirrored his own voice in the same vocation a moment ago, before taking another swig. Dean shot her a glare in the mirror and then scoffed as she stuck her tongue out at him before having one more drink. "Bite me." She breathed when she brought the bottle down into her lap.

"I should be hitting you." Dean breathed.

"Wait the guys dead..so he can't kill me right?"

"Oh...yeah." Dean's mock innocence came through for what it truly was and Leah frowned slapping at the back of his head.

Leah realized that Dean had already known that before he'd suggested the hitting. "Oh you bastard."

"Hey I just saved your ass." Dean lost his half smile in disbelief that she could call him that after everything that had happened.

"Oh so that was a joke?" She asked angrily.

"Yeah." Dean sniffed as he switched his view from the road to the back seat back and forth.

Leah slapped him again and he caught her hand over his shoulder before she could connect with the back of his head. "Do it again and I'll take you up on that bite." Dean warned her. Leah yanked her arm back and sulked back into the seat with a glare. Then as quickly as it had been there she sighed the anger away and shifted her gaze to the window taking another drink from the bottle.


	13. Chapter 13

1Chapter Thirteen

Dean pulled the Impala over on the lone country road called Harpers seeing Bobby's truck hidden a bit off road. Bobby was standing outside his vehicle leaning back against the hood of the truck with his hands in his pockets. He straightened up as soon as Dean turned the car off and gave him a nod.

Sam smiled as he opened his door and shifted his feet to balance them on the heels outside the car...hopefully able to bring himself into the conversation a bit easier then just rolling down the window. Leah climbed out of the car behind Dean seeming to be holding her liquor well. Sam was surprised that she wasn't passed out in the back seat. She was still mostly walking straight even. Though took the bottle with her.

"God am I glad to see you." Dean smiled as he and Bobby shook hands and shared a smile of relief that everyone was still alive.

"Good to see you too, Dean." Bobby nodded then he looked around him to where Sam had propped himself in the passenger seat and his smile faded. "Sam." Bobby called as he and Dean made their way around the car with Leah following.

"Hey Bobby." Sam nodded his breathing still labored through the pain. He noticed Bobby's gaze shift to his wrapped feet and followed his eyes to the mass of gauze there. "It looks worse then it is."

"Let me see them?" Bobby was skeptical about Sam's optimism. "And someone can start filling me in whenever you get ready."

"I'm Leah by the way." Leah said indignantly all at once. She had been out of Bobby's view upon exiting the car in Dean's wake. Bobby's head jerked up and he took in the blonde, her arm practically tied to her chest. He rose and would have offered her a hand but she had her good hand occupied at the moment.

"Nice to meet you." Bobby nodded in her direction. "That looks painful." He added and motioned to her arm and the blue now lining her swelling jaw.

"Wow we really are a wordy lot." Leah scoffed as she sat down on the hood of the Impala.

"Ok so the story?" Bobby kept going as he started to unwrap Sam's feet to see if he could help with anything.

"Hey get off the car." Dean looked back at Leah in disbelief.

"Dean...stay with me here...what the hell is going on?!" Bobby finally got out in frustration.

Sam was the one that answered him though. "We got in town about at about midnight and found a place to stay. We'd just come from a job a few states over. I woke up with a vision about 4. Some girl getting killed. Then Leah blinked into our bathroom..." Bobby looked up to meet Sam's eyes at that.

"Blinked?"

"Yeah she can go from place to place in the 'blink' of an eye." Sam explained seeing Dean helping Leah off the hood of the car. She was now smiling with pride as Sam mentioned the name she had given her ability. Bobby chanced a glance in Leah's direction. "She blinked from her apartment to our bathroom and can't go back until she helps us end whatever is going on here...at least she can't blink home...anyway. So we decided to check out a few lighthouses when we determined that the vision had been in or near one. We didn't get far past the front gates of the first one, the Bounty Lighthouse. Leah and I both saw a figure walking against some ghostly fog."

Bobby finished unwrapping the first foot and frowned at what he saw there. He swallowed thickly as he nodded following along. Dean and Leah now joined the conversation more attentively.

"I didn't see anything." Dean pointed out. "Just these two freaks."

"Right." Sam nodded not taking offense to the freak remark even though he heard Leah gasp in disbelief at Dean's back. "Anyway the guy said something...uh..."

"He said 'Welcome home.'" Leah piped in.

"Right." Sam looked to his foot as Bobby started to reach to touch it. "Please don't." Sam interjected just before his fingers actually met the skin. Bobby paused and sighed with a nod.

"Ok so this guy said welcome home?" Bobby tried to keep the conversation going on.

"Yeah. And then he was just...gone and the visions started." Sam swallowed having to force himself to breathe before he went on. "I was in a bathroom in a tub...and some psycho was filling the tub up with ice and water. I was strapped in...couldn't move."

"He didn't come out of it...not like he usually does." Dean explained. "He started turning blue and experiencing the actual condition the girl was suffering from. Then Leah blinked into the bricked up bathroom that it happened in and found the body...she came back too fast to have done anything though. We all headed back to the hotel room...We got Sam warmed up..." he added under his breath. "Some of us went to more lengths then others."

"Was that a thank you?" Leah laughed out. "Look that is the last time I get naked to help a hypothermic..."

Bobby's head snapped up to them with a raised eyebrow and contemplative quiet as Dean was now smiling that she was divulging way more information then he had planned on.

"Then I blinked into a bar in my birthday suite and found out that twenty years ago a string of missing persons cases began in town. And that ...our bathtub lady was the first and she disappeared from Spankey's bar and pool hall."

"Sam got to feeling a little bit better and started doing some research and we called some other people to see what we could dig up while we waited for little miss sunshine here to get cleaned up." Dean watched as she sank back down on the hood again and clenched his fist. "Leah..."

"What?" She asked innocently. "Oh." She straightened up again.

"So we found out that there were 35 people that had gone missing over a 10 year period. So far the visions and blinks have located thirteen. Twelve in some sort of big honking warehouse like room with creepy blacked out windows and Solomon's key on the floor...and one in a bricked up bathroom. We don't know about the others yet." Dean started again. He was getting tired of this instant replay recount of the story and thought he'd get to the heart of the matter. "Basically the victims of the killer there have been trying to tell Sam and Leah their story..." Bobby cut him off.

"Solomon's key? And why Sam and Leah...why not you too?" Bobby asked quickly.

"Yeah Leah blinked into that room after Sam had a vision about some girl being suffocated and stabbed in front of a room full of people...the other people were supposedly other victims and the psycho was trying to keep some control over them with a scare tactic...Leah is the one that saw the circle though...Sam didn't mention seeing it in his vision. So I'm wagering it was after the vision that someone decided that none of them were going to be going anywhere. " Dean began. He was too engaged in conversation to notice Leah sinking back onto the hood of the car stretching backwards as she actually made herself comfortable laying across it with a satisfied sigh. "And I imagine that they connected with Leah and Sam because from what we can gleam from Sam's visions all the victims were psychics."

"The yellow eyed demon was involved." Sam whispered as Bobby began to wrap his foot back up. "In the vision where this..." He motioned to his feet. "Happened...I saw him...he was talking to the killer. Sounded like this was some sort of experiment with mass possession of psychics. He was pissed because it wasn't working."

"Ok so the victims are contacting you with the story of the experiment and their deaths. They want peace...but the circle..."

"We think the corpses still have the demons inside them." Dean looked down at his feet wondering how crazy he sounded now. "That the psychics turned the tables on old Yellow eyes. That they had control and wouldn't let the demons leave...and then the demons got them back by keeping their spirits here after they died."

"Vindictive little bastards." Bobby nodded speaking of the demons. "That's amazing though." His eyes widened. "I mean demons being controlled by humans is like an a front to what they consider the natural order of things. But you have to ask yourself one thing...Why would the head demon bind all the others?"

Dean and Sam shared a glance in wonder before looking to Bobby. "I mean he'd want to find a way to get his minions out of them if whatever he was doing wasn't working. So why put a binding circle on the floor and leave them...that's almost like some other form of hell. They must have sure pissed him off."

"What do you mean?" Sam asked with a gasp as Bobby finished re-wrapping his foot.

"Think about it like an evil family of cutthroats and back stabbers...loyalty only comes so far as your moving up. Everyone is out for themselves...if they see a chance to rise in power and come out with as little repercussions as possible then they take it. Your head demon caught wind of a mutiny...and he stopped it. That's just a guess, but I can't think of another reason why he'd do that." Bobby paused thoughtfully. "So you have a psycho killer in league with the bad ass demon and then twelve lesser demons trapped in a binding circle in some building where you need to get in and release some spirits. Sounds like a cake walk." Bobby smiled softly.

"Well actually..." Dean wrinkled his nose up as he furrowed his brows in a remorseful fashion. "Um...Leah broke the circle when she blinked...that's where she broke her arm."

Bobby froze.

"Yeah." Sam nodded seeing the look that crossed his face.

"Shit." Bobby pushed himself back up to his feet and looked to his truck with a shake of his head before turning back to the group. "So you have twelve freed...maybe insane demons with all of your names stuck in their heads and a broken circle?" Bobby's voice rose as he spoke.

"That about covers it...but don't forget the psycho killer that Dean supposedly killed." Leah chimed in happily as she scooted back to try and get a little bit more comfortable on the hood with a yawn.

"Supposedly?"

"He disappeared after the knife hit his throat...I think he was astrally projecting himself...so I don't know if he's dead or not." Dean nodded.

"This is like a damn Three Stooges recap." Bobby rolled his eyes at the group.

Leah giggled at the comment with a broken "You have no idea.." As Dean finally noticed that she was back on the car. Dean's head craned backward as his teeth clicked together with a 'oh man' groan as his eyes widened from sympathetic frustration.

"She's drunk." Sam reminded Dean.

"I know." Dean said with even more of frustration in his voice. "Leah." Dean started as he walked to the hood of the car planning on just moving her back to the back seat to keep her off the car for the rest of this conversation. He wrapped his arms around her waist and gingerly avoided contact with her broken arm as he pulled her up against him hearing her giggle again from the movement. "We've really got to talk about how you treat my car." Dean said to her as she wrapped her good arm around his neck slinging the bottle around and nearly beaming him with it on the way. Dean avoided the knock to the head as she pulled her face flush with his and without missing a beat her lips met his.

Dean's eyes widened under the passion behind the embrace and the heat of her lips against his still very aware that Sam and Bobby were standing right behind him. Her eyes met his with a soft smile still against his lips when she realized how nervous he was. "That was a thank you for knocking me out." She whispered against his lips feeling his body tense.

No sooner was Dean really wishing that Sam and Bobby weren't here and he didn't have a case that could kill them all, so he could explore this possible avenue, then Leah was gone the faint feel of her lips against his still haunting him as he pitched forward over balanced from her sudden blink.


	14. Chapter 14

1Chapter Fourteen

Leah hit the floor with a grunt and yanked her good arm still holding the rum up to avoid the bottle cracking against the hard concrete floor. It was pitch black again...and for once she didn't even want to know what was in the room with her. She breathed against the musty darkness feeling a chill shiver through her. Charcoal and ash seemed to squeeze around her as her hand met deep piles of the silty feeling soft ash that had yet to be scattered by the stir of echoes...by the distant flutter of the present. "What the..." She felt the bottle sink into a pile up to the top of the label.

"So we've usually got a window of about five minutes or less before she blinks back." Bobby listened to Dean as the two of them slung bags from Dean's Impala into the truck.. Sam already sat in the center of the truck cab leaning back wearily as he watched them work at a frantic pace.

"She should have already been back." Sam called out as he looked to his cell phone face.

"Give her a few more!" Dean called back. Dean then looked to Bobby, the two in mid stride. "There is a hospital in Milton...it's four towns over and across the State line. When she gets back...I don't know what kind of shape she's going to be in so we should have the truck running ready to get there in record time. If she's barely hanging on then we can just cross the county line and make it to Hanover in five minutes."

"Sounds good." Bobby tossed the last bag into the box resting behind the cab of the truck and slammed the lid and lock into place.

Leah slipped against the silty floor as she shakily got to her feet her breathing coming fast her despite the fog clouding her brain. There were some things that liquor didn't seem to help alleviate. She blinked several times against the blackness finally plunging her good arm into the depth of the room trying to feel her way through the haze as she waded through what seemed like an endless knee deep obstacle. She connected with a metal wall and immediately began to follow it to the left. "Left wall theory." She whispered trying to cheer herself up. It was an old saying of her brothers from his dorky days of puzzles and games. He often said that to keep from getting lost in a maze you should always follow the same direction at the turns...It was Justin's left wall theory...he always went left.

She smiled against the tears dotting her eyes as she felt along the wall and picked her legs up higher and higher the further she went. It just kept getting deeper. She had long forgotten about the bottle behind her and the kiss that she had initiated what seemed an eternity ago. She felt a break in the wall ...a recess...something...She quickly explored it's depth and the wall that began on the other side before she followed the wall around to the left and suddenly felt hinges against her finger as she found a door.

Sam looked to his right to Dean starring hard out the windshield as if the day light was going to some how shed some light on the less illuminated aspects of this case so far. Sam was enjoying the tide of the liquor and the pain medication that had dulled the ache enough to handle to rest a bit. "She's been gone for fifteen minutes." Sam didn't want to think it, but as he had almost died twice himself...and she wasn't in the best shape her last blink...the possibilities weren't looking good.

"What was the longest blink?" Bobby looked across Sam and Dean his hands resting on the steering wheel as the engine idled with a rumble.

"Eight minutes." Dean whispered looking to where they had hidden the Impala...no one would find it in the time it should take them to finish this up. At least he prayed no one would. It was almost safer when he knew it was in the police impound yard. At least he knew no one was going to steal it.

"We should go to the light house." Sam ran his tongue against his lips feeling the dry cracking that came from his labors of breathing through the pain over the last few hours.

"We should take you to the hospital." Dean retaliated. "You can't do anything there but wait in the truck."

"I'll manage." Sam responded just as hard headed. "If she doesn't blink back...there's a reason."

"Yeah she's dead." Dean looked away and to the window betraying the flutter of emotion behind his eyes. "Give her a few more minutes."

Sam narrowed his eyes as all three of them turned their eyes to look out the front windshield in silence...waiting.

Leah ran her hand over the door and felt the indentation of a charred window beneath her finger tips...at least it smelled charred...and the film that covered it was dried and kinda sticky. She brought her fingers away with a grimace and wiped her hand on the side of her shirt wishing that window offered some sort of light from the room beyond. But there was none. She didn't exactly want to announce her presence by banging on the door in case she was in the building that housed the demons. So she felt for the knob and then sucked in a breath while she reached for the bobby pin she kept tucked in her hair behind her right ear for occasions such as these. "Probably think I'm dead." She muttered under her breath as she used her front teeth to pull the little rubber ball from the tips of the pin. She smiled as she spit the soft cover away and used her teeth to pry the pin open. She felt for the knob again.

Luckily, she had done this in varying degrees of sobriety and even so drunk off her ass that she could barely stand. So it felt like home save the possible demons and the strange ash field room. She suddenly cursed as she felt the lock un latch and thought of the bottle she left behind. "Dammit." She whispered before turning the knob with a loud sigh and opening the door outward. She sure as hell wasn't going back for it.

The room beyond was just as dark and she cringed at the lack of light. Back to the left wall theory...she thought to herself as she began to place her hand where the door had been latched and suddenly heard the creak of hinges. Leah furrowed her brow and pulled her hand back just as the door slammed closed again and the lock locked back into place. "Oh hell no." She whispered angrily. She hit the door in frustration as a slither in the ash sounded behind her giving causing her to freeze as she slowly turned in that direction even though she knew she couldn't see anything.

"We should go back to the light house." Sam repeated finally after twenty minutes and still no Leah.

"Sam..." Dean began, but Sam didn't want to hear it.

"She may be alive...maybe unconscious...what if she passed out." Sam replied. "And she's blinked in close to the light house more then anywhere else...Dean it doesn't mean she's dead." Sam was fervent in his attempt to get through to Dean who was slowly processing that much.

Dean covered his mouth in an attempt to hide the frustration of the decision, but only really gave away his own difficulty with it.

"He's right." Bobby nodded. "You boys have been through a lot the last few hours...but we have to end this. "

"I know." Dean said glad that Sam had given him another option to ponder besides her possible demise but he worried that Sam could get hurt worse then he already was while they were there. "Ok lets do it. Sam you stay in the truck though."

"Right." Sam replied having no intention of following Dean's order on that. They were going to need every available body searching. And if he had to use the shovel as a crutch he was still going in there. She was a psychic...just like him...it could be him in there and he wasn't just going to sit in the truck but he wasn't going to fight with Dean about it either.

Leah jumped when something flittered past her foot and she felt the bobby pin almost slip from her fingers as her back hit the door hard enough to cause pain to cascade dully through her broken arm. "Shit." She whispered...her labored breathing the only sound in her ears for a moment. "I have to start carrying a pin light." She said to herself, her voice bringing her an eerie measure of comfort.

When what felt like fingers wrapped around her ankles though...the small amount of comfort was gone. Leah tried to move but another hand was around her other ankle...another climbing up her thigh...around her good arm...winding through her hair...around her broken arm...she screamed.

Hands seemed to rise up from everywhere and her body was covered with them...Holding her in place...lifting her up...She felt her body turn prone in the air as she rode on a wave of hands, strong arms, her mouth now covered so that the screams were muffled into that phantom palm that smelled of burned flesh.

"Scoot over." Dean was half way out the back window of the truck grabbing a bag as they were now en route at a fast pace to the light house. Sam scooted as best as he could trying to keep Dean's behind out of his face. Dean finally returned triumphantly with a bag and a bull horn. "What's this for?" He asked Bobby holding up the bull horn as he fell back into his seat.

"You never know when those will come in handy." Bobby chuckled. "I used it last time I infiltrated a fire company about to go into a burning law office that still had a demon in it. The captain was pissed that the FBI needed to get a man in there for some sensitive material. Anyway I had to use the bull horn to do the exorcism through a concrete retaining wall when the demon accidently trapped himself in the boiler room. They got the guy out though...and I got the demon out so it was win win."

Dean chuckled at the mental imagery as he turned the bull horn over in his hands. "I can't believe that worked."

"Me either... I was a little surprised." Bobby returned the smile as he turned left onto the bridge that led to the light house.

"Sounds like you and Sam should stick to the intuitive aspect of this job. Remember that holy ground thing and the truck?" Dean started sniffing as he thought he smelled smoke.

Sam let out a laugh at that. "Yeah I think you were pretty set to kill me after that." he chuckled. Sam felt Dean and Bobby's eyes on him as soon as he got that out though and he froze wondering if he had grown another head. "What?" Sam noticed the puff of smoke that passed his lips as he asked the question and suddenly felt warmth spreading through his body.

"Sam?" Dean's eyes took a fearful glint as he tossed the bag into the floor board.

"God it's hot." Sam suddenly got out as the warmth began to spread through him taking on more and more heat. There was a flash of light in his vision blinding him momentarily and he held up his arm across his face feeling the pressure of what felt like a dozen or more bodies pressing in against him. They were all screaming. All of them...and then the flames jumped across their bodies...and Sam joined the bellowing cries of the dying.

"Pull over." Dean screamed out as soon as Sam started screaming. Bobby was already moving in that direction though as though he had read Dean's mind. Dean had the door open before the truck stopped and he grabbed Sam by both sides of his button up shirt feeling the heat of fire searing his hands as he grabbed him. Dean didn't let go though. Instead he grabbed him tighter and ran with him to the guard rail of the bridge taking the both of them over in one jump.

The slap of the cold water took Dean's breath as he hugged Sam's body to his surfacing choking on the steam that poured off Sam...as he waited for the vision to end and hoped like hell that the water was enough to keep Sam from getting burned.

Bobby put the truck in park and ran to the guard rail leaning over as far as he could until he gasped at the site of Dean starring up at him with, a still steaming Sam in his arms. Dean and Bobby met each other's fearful gaze as some sort of understanding seem to pass between them. Sam finally sagged against him and Dean felt his skin cooling off under the water's choppy movement. "He's alright." Dean called up to Bobby...though deep down...Dean wasn't really sure...this was scaring him more then he could ever admit.

"Get him back up here..I'll get some towels." Bobby ran to the back of the truck and climbed over the tail gate and into the back going for his supply box as Dean started swimming back to shore with Sam tucked against him.

Leah wasn't sure when she passed out...but when she woke she was on her stomach...flat against a grate and the light were flickering along the brick room. She winced at the weight against her arm as she spotted the bottle of rum with a drunken smile and pushed herself up with her good arm blinking against the strobe effect of the lights against the red brick. The room was like a conch shell wrapping around in circles. She'd never seen anything like it. But she really didn't care at the moment.

She grabbed the bottle and took another swig as she scooted her back against the wall trying to still her nerve enough to make a run for it. Her arm had come unwrapped from all the hands against her and she noticed the patchy T-shirt wrap that Dean had made lying on a pile of ash a few feet away. She pressed the bottle to her lips once more and suddenly froze swallowing slowly.

"_It was a red corridor. Flickering lights. Your arm was broken...with the elbow poking through the skin."_

Leah set the bottle down as the temperature in the room began to plummet. "Oh God." She whispered.


	15. Chapter 15

1Chapter Fifteen

He stood in the shadows of the hospital room a frown stretched across his face as he saw the deathly pallor to his puppet, Donovan. He should have known that the Winchesters were involved. He should have known.

The cell phone rested against his ear as the light from the rising sun caught the glint of yellow against his eyes. "Hendrickson," His voice sounded deep to his own ears as he watched the nurses pass by in the hallway outside unaware that one of their long time patients had passed.

"This is agent Hendrickson." A voice finally answered the phone.

"I have an anonymous tip about the whereabouts of Dean and Samuel Winchester." The demon smiled as he closed the shades in the room.

"You better not be pulling my chain here. This a serious case and those two are extremely dangerous." The demon loved to hear the distaste the man had for Dean and Sam. The hate he had inspired in his heart. He was as much a puppet as Donovan had been...the only difference was that Donovan knew he had been using him. "If you are anywhere near them then you better find a way to get clear."

"They are at the Bounty light house in Greenburg, Va. Their hotel room was registered under Lester Berks...and was shot up half an hour ago. They are in the company of an exotic dancer by the name of Leah Galviston. You're going to have a lot of deaths on your hands if you don't hurry. "

"Who is this?" He definitely had the FBI agents attention now.

"A friend." The demon slid the cell phone shut and with one more look to Donovan he disappeared.

OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

Leah climbed upward back to her feet as she looked around frantically waiting for the killer to appear out of no where...for Sam's vision to become a reality. When nothing immediately occurred she only felt the fear growing...slowly building inside her. She started down the corridor at a fast trot following the throngs of sooty foot prints. There were so many of them.

She paused as a sob echoed through the corridor. "Hello?" She whispered. It sounded so close. It was followed by another and another and another until the sobs grew into screaming...and the screaming grew into a cacophony of sound that caused her to scrunch up her face against the pain ringing through her ears. She placed a hand against the ear she could block waiting for the screams to fade...then all once there were lines of people being marched down the corridor...into the room she could only assume she had been in. Leah followed behind them. They passed cells that flickered in and out from past to present.

Leah felt her stomach clench as she saw the deeply etched lines against the walls inside the cells...the markers of days spent here. It started twenty years ago...twenty years...she reminded herself...with the last disappearance ten years ago...and then nothing. Some of these people had been here for years...a part of the experiment. What could have possible sustained their sanity?

She followed the lines realizing that it wasn't really one large group, but all the spirits telling her their story at once...the one by one demise of the rest of the people that they had yet to find...the total still a horrendous 35.

She walked to the room filled with ash and gagged on the smell of burning flesh as one by one the people walked into the incinerator...into the flames. Leah covered her mouth as the tears stung her cheeks. There was ash from 22 different people in that room. Leah looked down the length of her body realizing that the ashes were all over her.

There was something else though...she pushed the thought that she was covered in people away as she tried to figure out what they were trying to tell her. There was some sort of symbols like a border going all the way down the corridor...inside the cells...inside the incinerator. They were every where.

The ghost's depiction of their demise faded and Leah began to walk further away trying to see how far the symbols went. She had never seen anything like them.

OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

"This has been a hard job." Bobby's voice at his back didn't give him any more peace.

"Par for the course." Dean replied as he stripped Sam's shirt off him on the grass and took the clean dry shirt that Bobby was handing him. "Not a problem." He swallowed taking in the bruise around the knife wound that had been stitched up before he swallowed back the anger and frustration to act like this was just another normal something as he dried Sam's chest off and slowly eased him into the dry shirt.

"Keep telling yourself that and when you have that break down...ya let me know so I can help keep your brother out of trouble while your recoverin' " Bobby nodded seeing Dean stiffen where he sat on his knees trying to hurry this process up so they could get to the light house.

"I'm fine, Bobby and I'm going to stay fine." Dean replied defiantly.

"You sound just like your Dad. I'll swear if he didn't tell me the exact same thing. Word for word." Bobby turned away as Dean eased Sam's pants off over the wet gauze. "And I'll tell ya somethin' Dean... You may be just as stubborn and tough as him but I remember it when he cracked."

Dean's breath caught in his throat at that. He paused before working Sam's boxers off and quickly grabbing another pair. Dean had him in the boxers and pants before Bobby or him looked at each other. Dean met his eyes as he picked Sam up and started on the way to the truck. He stopped right in front of Bobby with Sam over his shoulder. "I'm not going to crack, Bobby."

And with that he walked right past him to the cab of the truck to get Sam resting against the seat again.

"Not more then once." Bobby breathed under his breath knowing that if Dean did that there wasn't a chance in hell that he wasn't going to get himself killed. He followed him to the truck and climbed into the drivers seat. Dean wasn't going to talk about it and Bobby had done his part to bring it up. But now it was up to him to find some other way to deal with all of this...because Bobby could see the tell tale signs like a neon road map.

"Lets get this over with." Dean slid in next to Sam putting the wet clothes in a plastic bag before getting the weapons ready.

Bobby gave him a nod and pulled back onto the bridge heading to the light house in silence.

OOOOOOOOOOOOO

Leah stopped at a gate that seemed to have been placed in the center of the hallway. The corridor went on ward but the symbols ended at the gate. There was a small desk just beyond that looked to have housed a guard once...maybe more then one. God what this place must have been like when it was in operation.

Leah felt the lull of the liquor still coursing through her blurring her vision as she cursed that the lights were still flickering...even as she wished that they wouldn't go out because she was hating the dark a lot more then the headache the flickering was giving her. She placed her good hand against the gate and jumped feeling the electricity shock her. "Jeez." She breathed.

It was electrified?! She looked to the bobby pin that she had woken with still in her hand and let her head fall to the side with a groan of frustration. She would get fried trying to pick that damn lock. She turned around a moment later refusing to be un done as she decided to find something that wouldn't conduct electricity or melt to gain her way to freedom. She was only a few steps away from the door when she heard a louder groanish growl behind her...beyond the gate. "What now?!" She screamed turning around tossing her good hand up in the air and then letting it fall to hit her thigh.

She froze. "Oh..."

She would have added a four leader word behind that...but the twelve corpses standing opposite her with only an electrified gate between them sort of took her breath in surprise before she was flung down the hallway and into the nearest wall.

OOOOOOOOOOOOOO

Sam let a moan escape his lips as reality began to surface in the fog of pain killers and liquor. He should have stayed out, but something was pulling him to the surface of consciousness. And he wasn't going to fight it. As he surfaced he realized what it was.

"Dean?" Sam gasped out feeling like he had a sun burn from hell.

Dean was quiet as Sam's eyes settled on him. Sam studied his features...half trying to figure out what was going through his mind...half trying to find the words to explain what happened to the other people around the light house of death. It was Dean's expression though that cut into Sam. He was too quiet. Too focused on readying the weapons...his jaw too tight...his teeth clenched together just a little to tight.

Sam had half a mind to say something about it being him that had taken the brunt of the damage, but he stopped himself. Sam's self restraint about emotional issues was a little bit different...not better...just different. Maybe it was his ability to stop himself from picking a fight...maybe he just remembered how deep that river of torment ran into his soul when Dean was the one in his shoes.

Sam didn't think on it too long though. Dean was finally looking at him...through him...his anger at the thing responsible for this apparent in every feature. It was one of those times that fit into the Dean and psycho hunter theory of horribly bad coping skills that had Sam on edge all the time now. "God I feel like I fell asleep under a sun lamp."

"You look like it too." Dean looked back to the weapons as Sam saw the corner of his lip turn in a smile. "What did you see?" He cut through the sarcasm in the blink of an eye and that got Sam even more worried.

"The rest of the missing." Sam replied quickly licking at his lips as he looked down to his freshly changed clothes wondering how long he'd been out. "When did we..."

"We just stopped long enough to get changed." Bobby replied answering the question for him. Everyone grew silent as the light house came into view.

Dean was the first one to break it. " So I take it they were set on fire?" He asked leaning forward to get a good look at the place.

"Yeah." Sam nodded not taking his eyes off the beam still turning in the daylight. "Aren't they supposed to turn that off when the suns up?" Bobby stopped just outside the gate and looked to the man impaled on the gate that was locked in place.

"I guess he didn't get around to it." Dean nodded to who he assumed was the caretaker.

"Guess not." Sam shifted uncomfortably. "No Leah?"

"No Leah." Bobby confirmed. "Man you can feel the evil here."

"Yeah it's intense." Dean agreed remembering the first time they had been here. He had been unnerved then and he didn't even have a clue what was going on at the time.

"Oh ho ho." Bobby suddenly perked up with a smile as he looked out across the land and climbed onto the side of the truck to get a higher look. "Now that's a real piece of art."

"What?" Sam asked him quickly, trying to follow what he was looking at.

"Your demon was really pissed. This gate forms the perimeter of the second circle." Bobby was glad that at the very least the little bastards couldn't leave the property but there appeared to be two building here and a lot of ground to cover even with the second precaution in place.

"Well then...looks like we've got some hunting to do after all." Dean climbed out on his side realizing that that meant if Leah was here that so were they...and that lowered her chances of survival significantly. "At least they don't have their demonic powers...should be simple..."

"Not if they have the psychic spirits abilities and the demons are in control." Sam countered.

"Right." Dean couldn't get a break...he just couldn't...Sam was right though. "Sam stay here...we'll be right back." Dean was not going to budge on Sam leaving the truck and the fact that it was outside the protective circle was enough of a safety measure for him. Dean grabbed two huge cans of Salt and tossed one to Bobby who caught it with one hand while pulling a shot gun from the back of the cab all while tucking a book into his pocket.

Dean grabbed his own shot gun with his now free hand and the two of them started through the gate silently...neither one looking back to see Sam struggling to get out of the truck behind them.


	16. Chapter 16

1Chapter Sixteen

"ETA : ten minutes." The crackle came and went in waves over his headset as he looked out the door of the helicopter before looking back to the rest of his team readying weapons inside the hold. Hendrickson wanted it to be sooner. The sooner the better. He didn't want another mishap...another near miss...another escape...he wanted the Winchesters...and he wanted them in custody...now.

The pilot had already warned that they would have to set down on the other side of the bridge and then drive the rest of the way in.

When the chopper finally landed there were three SUV's waiting there with more men. Hendricks jumped from the door slamming his clip in place before he started for the agent in charge of this new team to bring them up to speed. They clasped hands briefly and exchanged names that Hendrickson was sure he would soon forget. The team leader on the ground was Gordon Barns. "Glad you made good time." Hendrickson smiled as he looked to the long expanse of bridge that separated him from his goal.

"Wouldn't have missed this for the world." Gordon smiled...it was just a little off...a little blood thirsty...but Hendrickson liked that. He wanted someone not hesitant about this job.

"So we have at least three perps..." Hendrickson's voice rose as the helicopter departed. "We want them alive...but will not hesitate to tag and bag...does everyone understand?" He waited to see both teams nodding before he started with the pictures. "This is Dean winchester... wanted for three counts of murder in Missouri and Wisconsin, armed robbery, breaking and entering, countless fraud cases, and a whole host of other violations...His brother Sam...accessory to murder, armed robbery, and various felonies associated with his brother's crimes. Their father trained them like marines and in back woods survival...so do not under estimate their capacity. These men have escaped from police custody countless times... Taken out SWAT teams...They are not amateurs. This is Leah Galviston A.K.A Leah Harris ... An exotic dancer out of Traviston, TX. Don't let that fool you... she has obviously been underground for some time. She is currently on the Interpol's top one hundred for acts of terrorism in technological warfare. This is not a stupid crew folks! Exercise extreme caution."

OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

Leah rolled her head to the side with a groan as she cursed the blinking lights still flickering over head. She sat there in a heap against the wall wondering how long she had been out as she waited for the bastards to come finish the job. She didn't even hear foot steps though...no growly groans...no fried crispy corpses trying to navigate through the gate... "Toasty." She giggled to herself at the thought of that. It would serve them right to get fried.

"God, I am so drunk." She murmured to herself. Well if they weren't going to kill her she might as well get moving...see if she could avoid getting killed by something else. She felt sort of numb and dazed moving in various conditions of hilarity. Her mind needed to make light of as much as possible at the moment and she wasn't going to fight with her mind...it always won.

She forced a deep breath into her lungs once on her feet and grimaced against the pain that laced through her arm and chest before she doubled over laughing. This really had taken the cake. And some times laughing was all there was left to do. "I'm not dead yet." She called to the demons on the other side of the gate that were still well out of her view ever since they decided to fling her down the hall. She wasn't really antagonizing them...more like stating it so that maybe it would sink in to her own brain while she was moving on her way.

"Good to hear." Came a reply that she didn't quite expect.

"Dean?" She whispered he smile fading.

"Stay where you are." It was almost like an answer to her question...even though she was sure that he had heard her ask it. She heard the crackle of the gate then a shot gun blast that caused her to jump before two sets of footsteps sounded down the corridor. Leah noticed the bottle of rum roll against her foot and laughed again. She picked it up seeing Bobby and Dean round the corner as she straightened.

"About time." She beamed hugging her arm to her chest protectively.

"Yeah well...we had to make a stop to put Sammy out...he was working on spontaneous combustion..." Dean nodded straight faced though he was currently looking her over for further injury.

"Sounds like he's learning some new tricks..." Leah noticed Dean's hand out for her and mistakenly though he was reaching for the bottle. She handed it to him an watched with a gapping jaw as he tossed the liquor across the hallway. The sound of the bottle shattering glass set off anger that shown deeply through the gaze that she leveled at Dean.

"This is amazing." Bobby was studying the symbols lining the walls now though and Dean turned his attention from her anger not even the least bit taken aback.

"Care to clarify - preferably while we're moving?" Dean wanted to find these bastards, kill them, and get the hell out of here. He didn't like the idea of Sam being out there by himself...not matter how safe it seemed like he should be just waiting in the truck.

Bobby nodded before moving with Dean back the way they had come as Dean caught Leah's good hand and began to pull her along with him. "These are Tibetan...used to nullify psychic abilities...must have been precautionary... since it looks like they housed the psychics in the cells here." Bobby motioned to the borders around the wall. "Can't use any sort of ability inside the glyphs. No wonder she couldn't blink out...I'm sure in wasn't a problem...the energy required would have been initiated on the other side...where we were hiding the car."

"Yeah I think the demon did a little of that on the glyph free side of the fence here." Leah nodded. "They pack one hell of a punch."

"You saw them?" Dean rounded on her quickly having yet to step through the gate though Bobby was already on his way through it.

"Yeah all of them." She nodded. "Standing right there." She motioned to where Bobby now was. "Didn't seem all that interested in getting through the gate...must have known about the symbols." She explained. "Where's Sam?" She glanced around half expecting him to be hanging off Dean's back when he first came running in being that big brother seemed so protective.

"He's in the truck." Dean looked to the symbols with a sigh. At least he hoped that he was in the truck...Dean wasn't stupid though...they had to hurry this job up...

OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

The hard part wasn't getting the shovel to use as a crutch out of the truck bed...oh no that was easy compared to climbing the padlocked fence...Dean and Bobby had managed it easily enough being that they weren't that injured...but Sam was having a world of trouble with it. He couldn't just open it...or that would break the circle...and he was worried enough about everyone else without the demons having their own powers.

Sam put the majority of his weight on his right foot and lifted his left leg finding use of other muscles compensating for his inability to use his feet as usual. It took him a good five minutes and hell of a lot of pain to navigate the fence...He even managed to angle himself to land on his knees instead of his feet.

Sam took in a breath as his knees hit the ground slowly looking across the ground. The light house was the most obvious structure...but there was one other. A deep set in building built into the side of a hill. It's front windows bore the blacked out agent that he and Leah had both seen long before now. The back of the building though was buried into the hill. He hadn't seen many buildings built that way...but he knew it had been a trend at one time. Was supposed to save on all sorts of energy costs.

The door to the secondary building was wide open...as if announcing Dean and Bobby's whereabouts. Sam began to struggle to his feet. He paused seeing a black chopper flying over the light house grounds. "Son of a..." It didn't need to have an FBI logo to tell him all he needed to know. Sam was hurrying his hobble now moving toward the half buried building as he got his cell out of his pocket and dialed Dean's number.

"Yeah." Dean answered on the second ring as Sam felt cold tendrils of humid icy air creeping down his back.

"We have lots of heat inbound." Sam gasped out turning around slowly. The fog was rolling in from the shore again...just like earlier that morning only instead of a lone figure...there was a crowd...

"Gotcha...where are you?"

"On my way to you." Sam whispered, though his eyes never left the spirits headed in his direction.

"Dammit Sam..." Dean would have actually yelled at him, but they didn't have time for that now. "Local yahoos or some thing worse?"

"Something worse." Sam's voice fell even lower now and he wasn't sure wether he was referring to the FBI now or the spirits that had now stopped right in front of him.

"Welcome home." The spirits voices boomed in echoing waves through Sam's head as his knees buckled and the phone dropped from his hand. A scream tore through Sam as the first spirit disappeared into his body...followed by another...and another...and another...and another...their forms melding with his one by one by one...until at last there was no room left...

OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

Dean jumped when Sam's scream pierced his ear from the other end of the phone and was moving before he even acknowledged that something was going horribly wrong up there. "Bobby we got FEDS." Dean screamed before calling back into the phone. "Sammy!" As he and Leah crossed the threshold of the gate and the symbols.

The temperature began to plummet as soon as Leah crossed the threshold...and she shivered her good hand shaking in Dean's. But he was pulling he along...moving too fast...so fast...and she could feel the chills racing down her spine...causing the bristling waves of unease to force all the tiny hairs on the back of her neck to stand on end...goose flesh to break out in rippling waves. "Dean..." She arched an eyebrow seeing the vapor of her breath as it left her mouth.

Finally Leah pulled her hand away from Dean's feeling like a crowd of people was starring at her from behind...the fog was rolling in around her ankles...coming from out of no where. They were their...the spirits of the departed, standing inches away. "Welcome home." They whispered...and then is began...They walked right inside her...

Dean jumped backwards as Leah's whole form flew upward resting halfway between the floor and ceiling her back arched as she let out a scream that could shatter glass. Dean finally saw the fog...the spirits...what Leah and Sam had ranted about at the beginning of all this...he watched helplessly as they entered her body one at a time.

"Bobby!" The other hunter had gone to check the exit as soon as Dean mentioned FEDS.

"Dean, we've got a problem!" Bobby screamed from near the front door.

"Tell me about it!" Dean called back. Dean turned away from Leah still hanging in mid air cursing under his breath as he made the hasty decision to try and make it to Bobby. Dean slammed into a body though as he rounded and he froze as it registered that it wasn't just any body...it was one of the corpses...one of the possessed corpses...and the other eleven were right behind it. Dean didn't even get a chance to curse as he was suddenly flung backwards, his body sailing toward the electrified gate.

A/N : Julie - the clips I used of Jared in the hospital was from an ER episode he did. I do not know the name of the episode though - sorry. Hope that helps though!


	17. Chapter 17

1Chapter Seventeen

Bobby stood just inside the frame of the door out of view of the FBI agents that now were fanning out along the fence. Sam was no where to be seen...not inside the truck...not on the ground...Bobby cursed under his breath clenching his fist as he grabbed his can of salt back up. They had already lined the main exits and had started on the windows...but that was about to be blown to hell when the FBI came waltzing in.

Bobby's eyes widened as he saw the bolt cutters coming into view as one of Hendrickson's men approached the front gate. "No..." He breathed. "Dean!" They were about to break the circle and if Bobby cried out he knew he was as good as dead...but then again things were about to get a hell of a lot worse in here. Bobby was weighing the options...the FBI wasn't going to listen to him about the damn gate. They didn't even know what they were walking into...he pumped his shot gun turning away from the door and started in Dean's direction instead...The psychic elimination glyphs may be their only form of protection now...but that wouldn't stop the demons once they got up to full strength.

"Dean!" Bobby called again...when he didn't get an answer he cursed again and picked up his pace.

Dean was dead...he was sure of that as soon as his body was air bound...sailing past Leah now on her knees on the floor. Dean still held his gun clenched in his fist as he flew though and he only hoped like hell that he could get a shot off once he hit that damn gate...though he knew from experience that electrocution was going to fry his response. So it was all just wishful thinking...even though he pumped the gun in mid air...just in case.

Leah hit the ground on her knees and lowered her good hand to steady herself a smile replacing the scream from being bombarded a moment ago.

She finally understood.

She was on her feet so fast that Dean's body seemed to sail past her in slow motion...headed straight for the electrified gate. She stretched one arm out and halted his body inches from the gate.

Dean was panting hard by the time his body slammed to a stop the buzz of electricity from the gate trembling through his back side. It surrounded his body like a pulse as his eyes settled on Leah in utter shock. Her eyes were as gray as a Fall storm that brought about the most deadly natural events of his broken childhood. He felt his feet touch the floor a millisecond later and then she was turning away from him headed for the demons.

Dean heard Bobby screaming his name as the other hunter's voice grew closer...but Leah was moving toward the corpses. They obviously weren't worried about anything that these live bodies had to offer...as they stood their ground arms slightly away from their dark decaying bodies...heads bent down with a dangerous snarl playing across twisted lips.

"What the hell..." Dean broke off watching Leah's confident sway to her hips as she moved toward the demons...she held her broken arm as if it was anything but...even though blood was now flowing down her elbow from her movements.

"Bobby?! Leah's possessed by spirits...plural!" Dean called back in answer to Bobby screaming his name finally.

"Not gonna matter much longer!" Bobby replied in a scream as he broke into a run for Dean. "They have bolt cutters!" Bobby didn't want to just come out and say...hey the demons are about to get into a whole other realm of powerful and he knew Dean could read between the lines.

"Son of a bitch." Dean screamed out taking aim for the closest demon he could to divert their attention from Leah sauntering into their midst. "Where's Sam?!" Dean finally saw Bobby coming into view at a full run.

"Didn't see him!" Bobby called tossing the salt at Dean's feet. "They could have him in custody for all I know."

"He was on his way in." Dean screamed back as the first shot gun blast ripped a leg off the first corpse he hit. Dean half grinned as the demon fell with a loud thud and aimed at another hoping that having to gain their balance on one leg might throw them off a little...being that the gun shots weren't going to do much of anything once that gate was open. "Bobby get their legs...they can't follow of they can't walk." Dean fired again and watched the second fall with a triumphant smirk.

Bobby whirled and fired two shot in rapid succession as Dean reloaded. Two more fell under as their brittle appendages flew from their bodies. Dean aimed again as Leah finally seemed to have garnered the rest of the demons attention. "They're going to kill her." Bobby breathed as Dean fired two more shots and pumped the gun again.

"Leah!" Dean and Bobby screamed in unison as Bobby fired twice more. "Eight down." Bobby got the count. He and Dean both knew that wasn't going to keep them down long...Leah looked back at them from over her shoulder her smile growing into a wicked grin meant to bolster their confidence as she turned rapidly back to the demons.

"Pay backs a bitch." She whispered as soon as she got into ear shot. The main demon's glazed over eyes met hers as the psychic slaughter began. She nodded her head at the demon and Dean jumped as the bastard flew backward his broken dusty body shattering on contact with the force with which it hit the wall. The spray of remains seemed nothing more then ash betraying just how hard he hit that wall. Dean and Bobby took a step backwards meeting each other's eyes briefly.

"Maybe not." Bobby whispered in shock. Bobby's attention suddenly shifted to the left as he noticed Sam en route to Leah to join her efforts. There was one main difference though...Sam was floating a few inches off the ground...moving with ease...his eyes the same shade of Leah's.

"Sammy!" Dean screamed as he saw that Sam was closing in on the demons with that same insane overconfident spirit filled movement that was simply oozing off both Leah and him now. "They're both possessed." He whispered in horror.

Sam held up an arm and channeled the power that was coursing through his body...the combined psychic energies of the dearly departed...Two of the other demons still on their feet flew into the wall that their predecessor had just vaporized against and they exploded on contact just as he had.

"Everything's going to be alright." Dean heard Sam's voice in his head and froze.

"Like hell Sammy." Dean whispered in shock.

Hendricksons watched the chains slip off the gate as Gordon and his men had already started scaling the fence on the far side so they could come up along side the building undetected. He took hold of the fence with one hand and looked from his team to the wide open door of the huge light house out building. "This is it." He slung the gate open with a call of "Move move move..."

Dean watched in horror as the one legged Demons all rose to their feet their disembodied legs rejoining their bodies in the blink of an eye.

"Circle is broken." Bobby breathed watching in horror as Leah and Sam both flew toward the nearest wall before the demonic punch knocked the wind from his lungs and the gun from his hands as his body sailed into the wall beside the front door. It was a long way to fly and by the time he hit he felt like his lungs had collapsed on contact...fighting against pain that rivaled a two story drop as he finally managed to suck in a pain gasping breath.

Dean wasn't sure exactly what he was doing as he dropped the gun and picked up the can of salt at his feet before he felt the full force of that demon power ram his body into the wall opposite Bobby so that he was now facing the door...the door that the FBI was swiftly approaching.

Inside the large barely lit room...silence reigned as those that had hit the wall were so winded from the act that they could barely grunt let alone force out a string of words. The demons were fanning out now...the remaining nine at least...into the shadows as if to watch the show.

Nine...Dean had seen one demon cause so many fatalities that the thought of nine at full power was finally beginning to hit him with the weight of a ton of bricks. At first he thought that the spirits wanted to kill Sam and Leah but it was now becoming painstakingly clear that they wanted psychic puppets to channel their vengeance gig...like they knew the only way to become powerful enough to defeat what had lain dormant in this monstrosity was to channel every psychic ability they all had through one or two sources.

Sam and Leah had just become the last line of defense and Dean didn't like that one bit.

The silver lining to his somewhat drizzled day came when the FBI began to make their appearance in the door. Dean was poised for the perfect view of the event. There was a part of him that knew that he shouldn't be so chipper...He was after all torn up on the inside with dread and worry for his brother...for their new friend...for himself and Bobby...and of course the part of him that valued humanity over demons any day of the week...but still there was something innately poetic about seeing the team of heavily armed men who had come to take him away...waltz in the front door in perfect formation all their guns trained on him...the support columns blocking their view of the demons...now hiding in the shadows. There was something about it that gave him a sense of satisfaction...where there should have been none...He was sure it was just his pride...like what was about to happen was a HUGE "I told you so." in some odd sense.

"Dean..." Hendrickson was the last in the door. "Get those hands in the air." He screamed out.

Dean would have loved to oblige...but there was something about the way a demon pinned one to the wall that left little room for movement. He had already dropped the box of salt. It lay in a heap spilled all over the floor before him now. The FBI team was fanning out aiming at Bobby now...at Sam...at Leah...

"I'd love to." Dean grunted out. "But I'm kinda stuck at the moment...you really don't want to be here right now."

Dean froze as the demons slunk back into the shadows seemingly curious about the happenings going on with the dynamic groups. It wasn't the demons though that caused his blood to turn icy through his veins. It was the second team that was coming in the one lone entrance to the building.

"Everyone has to get out of here! Get that gate shut!" Bobby tried in vain as he was met by more screaming as the men were all baying them to get their hands up and on the back of their heads...for them to get on the ground...

"Perimeter is secured Sir." Gordon's eyes met Dean's even as he relayed the message to Hendrickson.

"Check mate." He mouthed to Dean before his eyes took in his position and the pieces began to fall together.

Dean simply smiled seeing Gordon piece together that there was a demon in the room as he screamed back.

"Like hell."

Dean's real focus though split in so many directions he could scarcely count the thoughts flying through his brain...was on Sam and Leah...silently pinned to the wall...eerily perched as if something in the way of a psychic dam was about to break.

They didn't act first though. The demons were swiftly growing bored with this display and the first indication came by way of the front door slamming shut. The second was just as fast and took every member of the twelve member team...even a well trained hunter like Gordon... off guard. They all lost their guns in the blink of an eye as their bodies flew to the walls.

Hendrickson hit the wall next to Dean with a scream as Dean heard his hand snap on the impact. Gordon ended up somewhere near Sam...which only got Dean even more infuriated...The others were scattered through the room pinned here and there...randomly distributed like lambs for the slaughter. "I told you you should have left." Dean breathed to Hendrickson, turning his head to face the well intentioned...yet completely off track agent.

Hendrickson was at a loss of words as of yet...the pain from the break and the shock of the unexplainable rendering him speechless. By the time he could speak his "What the hell is going on?" Did little to illicit a response from Dean who was watching Sam and Leah and Bobby and Gordon...the fear and threats escalating as the demons began to walk into the cascading light of the light house beam that came and went thrusting them in and out of darkness now that the door was closed.

The flickering light from the well guarded corridor beyond gave them a little more then pitch blackness...but even it was scarcely enough to see by. "You don't even want to know." Dean breathed trying to pull his head up from the wall but feeling it slam back against it like it was lead.

"Demons...ghosts...and hunters...Oh My." Leah cackled out as she slid off the wall in response to Hendrickson's question. "Ok...ok...just..." Leah doubled over laughing hysterically as Sam came off the wall beside her the both of them looking to the demons headed in their direction. The evil from hell knew where the real threat lay. "Look guys...just give me second here...this is too funny." She held up one finger toward the demons and watched as the demons froze in place.

At first Dean thought they were actually listening to the raving drunk, but then he realized that they had frozen as in unable to move...to speak...like time had stopped for them. Unfortunately, for the current situation, their powers seemed to extend beyond time as no one but Leah and Sam was able to peel themselves from the wall.

"Sammy get the book...you can exorcize these bitches right now..." Dean exclaimed as soon as he realized that the demons were out of commission. "Bobby's got it."

"I can't do that." Sam, his feet still not touching the floor, craned his neck to look at Dean. Suddenly a chuckle burst forth from him whole heartedly as he looked to Leah trying to pick herself up off the floor.

"The demons guys!" Bobby called out, fighting to pull his hand from the wall, only to have it slammed back into it. "What the hell is wrong with you two...You're acting like you sniffed a freakin' glue factory."

"Vengeance is mine sayeth the Lord," Sam giggle again. "Except when I'm around." He sailed his body higher up in the air.

"Oh God." Dean closed his eyes. "What did I do to deserve this?"

"What the hell is wrong with us.. He ...just ...asked...Oh my god." Leah was actually laying on her back on the floor now laughing so hard that tears were streaming down the side of her face. "We've got a dozen people in our heads...and he asks what's wrong...Oh My God..." She rolled on to her side. She slowed down and panted her laughter dying down allowing her to breath, before she burst out laughing again. "Oh if you could all hear your thoughts..."

"Hostility and aggression...Guys whatever happened to LOVE?" Sam smiled beautifully.

"Sam can we deal with the demons?" Bobby's voice was beginning to betray his mounting frustration.

All around the room the FBI agents were screaming, shouting, fighting to get free, but all that receded from the hunters minds...because they could only focus on so much at once, but next to Dean Hendrickson's quiet whisper of "Demons?"finally penetrated Dean's senses. Dean looked back to him incredulously. "Yeah Hendrickson, Demons. Demons meet Hendrickson. Hendrickson meet Demons."

Dean was worried as could be about Sam, the strain on his already injured body must be incredible...but as Sam was the only one, besides drunk-of-my-ass-Barbie, capable of movement at the moment and Sam had already wasted two of the demons Dean's fear was abated slightly and he indulged his triumph over Hendrickson slightly.

"Yeah the walking flinging...pin your ass to the wall bastards over there...they're demons. I know you've seen that confession tape from Baltimore. I wasn't lying."

Dean focused on his brother once more. "Or insane." If he could have nodded his head to the left to go along with the sigh he would have.

"Hey Sam want to hurry this up and deal with the demons?" Bobby was getting angry.

"Yeah Sammy..."

"Don't rush me, Dean...you're always pushing..There is something I want to do first." Sam was still laughing...the words coming between chuckles as he rounded on Gordon and without a single word of warning kicked him in the balls.

"Pay back. I didn't really get a chance to share my feelings on your assassination attempt on me Gordon...and I'm a sharing kinda guy."

Dean wasn't sure if he was wincing for Gordon or for Sam's foot. He seemed to be not feeling pain at the moment...just like Leah...but Dean had a suspicion that it was going to hurt like hell later. Finally though Dean had to smile in pride for that one second of satisfaction at seeing the look on Gordon's face when Sam's foot connected.

"Way to go Sammy...It is Sammy in there...somewhere...Isn't it?"Dean replied lulling his head as much as he could in Hendrickson's direction. "Seeing as we're doing introductions here Hendrickson, meet the real Gordon. This here is a vampire hunter with a little problem with Sam and I...he's wanted for murder. Did he tell you that?...In fact last time I saw him he was in police custody...so uh bang up job there, with your information."

"Is anyone going to take care of the Damn demons?!" Bobby screamed out in frustration. Was anyone even listening to him or had they all gone completely off their rockers?


	18. Chapter 18

1Chapter Eighteen

Dean swallowed thickly against the bile rising in his throat from the position of his arms against the wall...the sinking in his stomach from watching the whole of the room slowly plummeting into chaos. The agents were screaming in horror...grunting...panting...struggling.

Bobby was glaring his eyes briefly meeting Dean's as Dean surveyed the situation. Leah was still on the floor...slowly picking herself up...the giggles coming to a manageable sort of half asserted action. Sam was backing away from Gordon...still not paying the demons or Bobby a bit of mind.

"You're going to pay for that." Gordon panted out, the pain so heart felt that tears were dotting his eyes as he worked to force out that little bit of hatred toward Sam. Sam's smile only broadened as he shook his head.

"You don't get it do you?" Sam whispered taking a step forward his head still shaking as he approached Gordon.

"I get that your tied into this whole freak demon thing...and that your going dark side...that's what I get." Gordon's pain began to ease up slightly betrayed by the anger and rage that was now tensed in the lines of his face.

Sam's smile slowly began to fade as he calmed his approach and stopped before Gordon, knowing that the man posed no threat to him in his current position. Sam's gaze shifted to the floor a moment before he met Gordon's eyes. "Well I guess it makes no difference then." Sam swallowed and licked at his bottom lip trying to do the right thing here, even though his anger was still amplified by the spirits need for vengeance. "That I'm about to save your life."

Sam held eye contact with Gordon seeing only the blink of a moments hesitation at that before Gordon's mask of hatred resurfaced.

"So Hendrickson, what exactly was your plan?" Dean sighed as he watched his brother locked in conversation with Gordon along the way.

Bobby was struggling harder against the wall across from them and had stopped trying to persuade Sam now...seeing it as a futile action.

"Why don't you tell me...you seem to think you know everything." Hendrickson laughed out. It was the kind of laugh that betrayed a level of uncertainty to one's fate.

"Lets see...uh you were planning on storming in here and getting your man...to hell with the innocent people involved...that's what you did in that bank in Milwaukee..." Dean met his eyes his own anger building as he recalled the careless endangerment that Hendrickson had placed those innocent bystanders in by storming the bank with a S.W.A.T. team locked and loaded.

"Except there aren't any innocents this time." Hendrickson didn't give in...didn't show an ounce of remorse for his decision in Milwaukee. Still Dean saw the fear registering as Hendrickson's eyes fell on the frozen corpses standing in the middle of the room. They were a hard sight to avoid as they made up the center piece of this freak show carny ride where in all the good guys and shades of good were plastered to the outer rim...spinning, at least in spirit, to the tune of hell's calliope.

"There is a room full of them." Dean breathed...To him the innocents though were humans that had no place here and every member of the FBI team fit the bill. "This is a world you shouldn't be involved in...it's ours...and your just mucking the whole thing up."

Dean watched as a flicker of movement shot through the center of the room. It was just an arm...an arm swaying slightly upward in the swing of a half step...that was going so slow you could barely see it. But the demons were breaking whatever hold Leah had on them. "Sam..play times over."

"God, You are insane..." Hendrickson laughed out all at once, oblivious to the demons tiny movements. "This isn't some fantasy freak world you get to be the hero in. There are rules and all this..." Hendrickson managed to swirl his head around to motion to the room. "I don't know how you're doing it, but it's just a cheap parlor trick that is going to unravel when we start plucking at the weave."

Dean paused a moment. He had plenty he could have said...plenty that he could have elaborated on...plenty that he could have tried, but in that one moment he decided that Hendrickson wasn't worth it. That no matter what he said this man was going to see exactly what he wanted to see and no amount of convincing was in Dean's favor. So instead of trying to bring Hendrickson on board Dean focused on the problem at hand...shutting him up with a half cracked smile and a short and snarky "Ah yes there are no limits to the depth of my diabolical mind." Dean added the effect of a fake momentary gloat before giving a humph of utter sarcasm and looking back to his brother. "Sammy...you hear me? Play time is over!"

"Yeah Sam!" Bobby piped in. "We'd like to live...if you don't mind."

Leah's whole demeanor seemed to be changing in the blink of an eye as whatever she did was wearing thin. "Sam." She called out her gaze fixed on the demons now. Sam finally looked away from Gordon turning to float next to Leah...to face the whole of the demons that were breaking through in bursts of movement now. They seemed to shift and freeze momentarily before starting up in some sort of struggle against the psychic energy she had released. "We through here?" Leah asked Sam all at once.

"Yeah." he nodded glancing only once over his shoulder at Gordon.

"Dandy." Leah smiled brightly as her body began to float alongside Sam's the two slowly picking up momentum as the temperature began to plummet further in the room.

Dean's eyes widened as he became transfixed with the movements of Leah and Sam...of the demons. His mind was reeling wondering what it was Sam and Leah could do to finish these guys off now that the demons had their full strength and they were obviously breaking through the effects of at least one of Leah's abilities. Dean was hoping that they had something else up their sleeves.

Dean felt the wall tremble beneath him as the dust shook from the recesses where the walls met the ceilings...falling over a swiftly silencing room. The electrified gate gave a creak pulling Dean's attention in that direction as a whole load of bricks laden with the Tibetan symbols meant to keep the psychic energy from that red corridor blasted out of the wall and slammed into the gate bringing the whole thing down. The symbols hit the floor breaking into pieces.

Dean let out a startled breath as he looked back to Sam and Leah...then to the demons who were moving faster now...less jerky...gaining control again. It was slowly sinking in...this wasn't about if the demon corpses were going to be destroyed...the sheer measure of power that the psychics seemed to be channeling through Sam and Leah was greater then even they had eluded to as of yet...enough to rival the decrepit demons. No it wasn't a matter of if...it was how and when.

The removal of the symbol laden bricks was the first step to evoke revenge and there was only one obvious way to die down that corridor that Sam and Leah and the spirits inside them seemed so interested in making passable to psychics.

The incinerator.

"God I'm good!" Dean called out to Hendrickson as he hid the shock playing across his face from the explosion out of the corridor.

Dean didn't know the game plan here...but he had a sinking feeling that he wasn't going to like it. "Sam quit dicking around...just bust 'em on the walls like the others!" Dean tried in vain. Sam seemed lost in his own world now though. His gaze was fixed on the demons. "Sammy!"

The first demon's head flew backwards...face to the ceiling...hand flying outward as if trying to handle the imbalance as it's twisted mouth opened in a roaring scream before the other demons followed one by one until the sound had everyone against the walls writhing from the volume and unholy timbre. "SAMMY!" Dean screamed.

"Finish this!" Bobby growled in a scream as well...now hoping to play on both psychics with the upper hand at the moment.

The demons screams were cut short as the first one flew in a reversal of fortune like it had been slapped by it's own innate telekinesis right down the corridor...followed by another and another and another...Sam went after the fifth one as if keeping them in line...like they were his responsibility and the rest were Leah's. Sam's following went a bit smoother as he simply floated after them with a fast flicker of motion that mirrored several spirits Dean had seen. As soon as he disappeared around the corridors winding edge The next demon flew in behind him followed by the last three and finally Leah.

"What the hell are they doing?" Bobby screamed at Dean as if he had all the answers.

"Taking them to the incinerator I think." Dean called back. "Eye for an eye kinda thing."

Suddenly everyone in the room pitched forward hitting the floor sprawled on their stomachs as the demons' hold on them lifted.

The shock didn't last long as the arms race began.

It was Dean and Hendrickson scrambling for the same automatic, while Bobby shoved himself to his feet in record time to race against Gordon to see who get armed first. The other's seemed slower on the uptake...but in a mere ten seconds...everyone was looking to get their hands on a gun.

Dean felt Hendrickson's arms wrap around his middle trying to lock him in a hold and he slammed his elbow backwards into his head before he kicked him off and grabbed the gun. Dean whirled on his back prone..and aimed at Hendricks. "Back up!"

Bobby's foot rammed into the butt of the first gun he came with enough force to and popped it up into the air as Gordon reached for his own. Bobby caught the gun and he and Gordon brought their weapons to aim in the same instant.

"I'm not here for you." Gordon said to Bobby trying to end the stalemate as the other FBI agents armed themselves.

"Yeah well...your not getting who you came for unless you go through me." Bobby saw the resolve in Gordon's eyes...the pressure his finger was exerting on the trigger. The total lack of guilt playing across his face...Bobby pulled the trigger before Gordon could finish what Bobby knew he was only a fraction of a second away from completing...he aimed for his arm...hoping to simply get the gun out of Gordon's hands.

Gordon screamed...and as that first shot was fired...the room erupted in gun fire.

Dean rolled as soon as he heard the first shots cursing under his breath. He watched Hendrickson tear his gaze from him to the erupting gun fire and took the opportunity to roll to his feet and run down the corridor to find Sam and Leah and another exit. He paused at the gate looking back at Bobby his breath hitching in his throat. The FBI agents were rounding on him.

"Put the weapon down...on the ground now...hand on your head...NOW!"

Dean cursed looking from the corridor to Bobby...this sucked out loud. Dean finally met Bobby's eyes as the gun began to drop from his hand and he slowly lowered himself to his knees. He didn't have to be a mind reader to know that he meant for him to go...and Dean gave a half nod before he did.

Dean rounded the corner feeling the heat before he saw it...only Sam and Leah weren't in the hallway outside the incinerator. Dean ran the rest of the way down the corridor still searching frantically before running back to the door his face a shattering visage of horror as he looking into the flames consuming the demons inside the incinerator. Sam wouldn't have gone in there...he couldn't have...could he?

Dean's hand slid up to the window watching the flames kiss the glass in a searing reminder of the heat in there as he shoved the whole of his body against the door. Dean frantically hit the large red emergency stop to the right of the door. The flames began to die down but the door still wouldn't give...it was like it had been locked from the inside...if that was even possible. "Sam!" Dean slammed his hand into the door seeing nothing but ash lining the floor in the room from his current vantage point.

This was not happening. Sam and Leah had to have gotten out...if they ended what she came to do...maybe she blinked. Dean put his stock there at the moment. He had no where else he was willing to place it.

They got out and he wasn't going to let himself think otherwise.

"On the floor, Dean." Hendrickson voice behind him was an echo of nothingness behind him. Somewhere Dean was aware of the click that removed the safety. "ON THE GROUND NOW!"

Dean slid to his knees in shock...not in compliance. Sam and Leah weren't dead...they blinked...they had to have. He needed to bolster that resolve...to make himself shove aside any thoughts that they could have been in that room when the fire went up.

"You have the right to remain silent." The cuffs clicked into place securing his hands behind him as he was pulled to his feet. The same old Miranda Rights spiel went on and on droning in the back of his mind as they walked him back to the front room. There were too many guns in the house for an escape today...and Bobby was in a pair of cuffs as well by now...Gordon was too even though he had someone following behind him trying to patch up his arm.

Hendrickson sent his men to search for Sam and Leah and when they returned the news onl y helped to solidify three facts...Two for the FBI...

One, there was no other exit.

Two, and this was the official FBI conclusion...Sam and Leah were dead having burned alive while inside the incinerator.

Three, not even entertained by the Federal Government, was that Sam and Leah blinked...back to her home...and at least if that much was true...no one would be looking for them. Dean smiled as that much at least as he wearily met Bobby's eyes.

All and all...this was not the way Dean envisioned this ending...not even a little.

A/N: This is the conclusion to FLUX...I'm starting the Sequel "Follow Me" on Monday. Hope you guys enjoy this...and there is a promo video for the sequel up on my profile page. Sorry I used the wrong name in responding to a question in the reviews a couple of chapters back. Anyway...have a great time guys! - Isa


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